Amazon

The AMAZON
Earth's Last Pulse

The Amazon Rainforest Located in South America, the Amazon Basin is 7,3 million square km wide. The Amazon Rainforest is about 6 million square km, and its majority is contained within Brazil (60% of the forest), Peru, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana, 9 countries in total. Also known as Amazonia, the Amazon Rainforest is located in the area along the equator where the climate is hot and humid, some ideal conditions for a dense evergreen rainforest. This rainforest is one of Earth main source of oxygen.

The Amazon river has the highest discharge (from 70,000 to 280,000m3/sec during flood season). From the Andes Apurimac where it starts all the way to the Atlantic it is 7025 km long and up to 10km wide. It can be navigated up to Manaus.

The Amazon river and its tributaries (Rio Negro, Japura, Purus, Madeira, Tapajos, Xingu, Araguaia, Tocantins…) water the Amazonia from the Guianas plateau North, to the Andes West and the Brazilian plateau South.

In the last 10 years, the Amazon Rainforest lost 500,000 square km (about the size of France), which became pasture for cattle, or farmland for Soybean cultivation. The Brazilian Amazonia annual deforestation rate is the largest globally.

PHOTO ON THE LEFT:

This child's life, and that of the bird, are being destroyed by sheer ignorance, greed, corporate crime and political insanity. Will YOU be a VOICE FOR CHANGE?

When you get to the bottom of this page you'll find these posters again. Click them and BE THE CHANGE this World needs on NOVEMBER 25.

The life of indigenous people may be hard to comprehend for those of us who have only known the comfort of trams, trains, buses, planes, cars, sidewalk coffee shops, TVs and movie houses. There's that superiority complex that comes with the idea that "we" are more advanced which puts us above indigenous people to the point where we insist on taking them out of their environment to place them in better more "hygenic" housing - such as you find in the ghettos of all cities. Not to mention that this has nothing to do with concern except for the fact that there are forests out there which need to be cut down for the processes of logging, mining, oil drilling, chemical monocrops and food for the biofuel industry.

The idea came to mind to add a row of pictures, the first was to be a typical black suit white shirt and tie "working" man carrying a black briefcase, on his way up the marble steps to his air "conditioned" place of "creativity", followed by a series of pictures of indigenous people in colorful traditional handcrafted clothing and face and body painted with natural antiseptic make up. But no, that would have destroyed the aesthetic magic of this page - despite the message of criminal environment, habitat, human life, wildlife and Planet destruction it conveys. Make no mistake... these white collar "officials" are the epitome of the slave labour and social and Planet destruction industry. So no, we'll keep this page liberated from the tailored undertaker suit, the story says it all.

Play the video ⬆ while watching the slide show ⬇

To dam the river Xingu is to re-invent the Amazon.
To go ahead with such insane project is a crime against Life

Articles, info & petition links

The Amazon is dying. It is a fact. Like a great tree under siege from legions of termites, it is being whittled away and degraded at this very moment by dams, loggers, development, poachers, farmers, and pollution. One fifth of the Amazon has already been destroyed, and even more has been degraded, and the process is only growing. If the current trend continues, we are the last generation that will witness the legendary forest that is the Amazon.

Sure, there will always be tropical forest in the Basin, but clutches of fragmented secondary forest does not constitute the Amazon Jungle. The Amazon we all know, the one which has existed for eleven million years in all its enormous and unfathomable inmensity, may be being lost. It is because of this that I have dedicated myself to documenting what I have seen and learned in my time there. This book is intended to be both a celebration of the incredible beauty and majesty of the Amazon, as well as a lament for what is being lost.

The Brazilian government is moving ahead "at any cost" with plans to build the third-largest dam in the world and one of the Amazon's most controversial development projects – the Belo Monte dam on the Xingu River in the state of Pará. The Belo Monte dam
complex dates back to Brazil's military dictatorship and the government has attempted to build it through various series of national investment programs including Brasil em Ação and the Program to Accelerate Growth. Original plans to dam the Xingu have been greenwashed through multiple public relations programs over the course of two decades in the face of intense national and international protest.

Impacts on Environment and People

In order to feed the powerhouse of the Belo Monte dam complex, up to 80% of the Xingu River will be diverted from its original course, causing a permanent drought on the river's "Big Bend," and directly affecting the Paquiçamba and Arara territories of the Juruna and Arara indigenous peoples. To make this possible, two huge canals 500 meters wide by 75 km long will be excavated, unearthing more land than was removed to build the Panama Canal. Belo Monte's two reservoirs and canals will flood a total of 668 km2 of which 400 km2 is standing forest. The flooding will also force more than 20,000 people from their homes in the municipalities of Altamira and Vitoria do Xingu.

Please help the Amazon!

March 2012 ~ Brutal Crimes Against Life

Click for News Report

Survival International ~ Saying it all in ONE minute!

Say NO! to the Belo Monte Dam
Email addresses of Brazilian Embassies Worldwide & Suggested Letter

brazemb-ksa.org embdakar@sentoo.sn administ.bratislava@itamaraty.gov.br seulmin@kornet.net consular@embajadadebrasil.es contato@brasilbcn.org rasemb@sr.net stockholm@brazilianembassy.se info@brasbern.ch consuladobrasil@general.chv braemsyr@net.sy info@brazilembassy.or.th brasemb@brasembancara.org kievbrem@brasil.kiev.ua visa@consbraslondres.com cgbos@consulatebrazil.org consbras@brazilmiami.org cgbos@consulatebrazil.org consular@consbrasdc.org consular@consbrasdc.org brazilsf@brazilsf.org consulado@brazilny.org consular@brazilhouston.org vcartigas@mre.gov.br info@ambrasile.it brasemb@brasemb.or.jp geral@kenbrem.co.ke embassy@brazil.org.kw braemlib@terra.net.lb embassy@brazilembassy.org.my brasembbamako@mre.gov.br brasemb.mexico@itamaraty.gov.br
ambassadedubresil@menara.ma ebrasil@teledata.mz brasil@brazilianembassy.nl brasemb@brazil.org.nz
conta@ibw.com.ni, brasemb.abuja@itamaraty.gov.br consular@brasil.no brasil.consular@nayatel.pk embrasil@embrasil.org.pa parbrem@embajadabrasil.org.py embajada@embajadabrasil.org.pe brasemb@info.com.ph brasil@brasil.org.pl geral@embaixadadobrasil.pt brasil@brasembdoha.com.qa braembuc@starnets.com brasrus@brasemb.ru embras@embrasil.org.ar mail@brasilemb.at info@brazilsydney.org brasbruxelas@beon.be elex@braseuropa.be brasil@brasil.org.bo main.mail@embassyofbrazil.co.bw sofbrem@infotel.bg mbiaunde@cameroun-online.com mailbox@brasembottawa.org embrasil@brasembsantiago.cl Consulate@Brazil.org.hk info@brazil.org.cn secom2@brasil.org.co, brasemb.rdc@ic.cd embajada@embrasil.co.cr zag.brem@zg.primatel.hr brazil@brazil.cz embaixada@brazil.dk contacto@embajadadebrasil.org.do ibec-ecu@trans-telco.net brasemb@soficom.com.eg embajada@brasil.org.sv nfo@brazil.org.uk brasemb@brazil.fi brasil@brasemberlim.de brasemb@africaonline.com.gh embragre@embratenas.gr brascom@intelnet.net.gt brastegu@sigmanet.hn embrasil@cbn.net.id embassy@braziliran.org info@brazil.ie embrazil@netvision.net.il

Suggested wording - always better to personalise if you have time:

HE Presidente Dilma Rousseff
Presidente da República Federativa do Brasil
Gabinete do Presidente
Palácio do Planalto
Praça dos Três Poderes
70150-900
Brasilia DF
Brazil

Your Excellency,

I am concerned about the possible construction of the Belo Monte mega-dam on the Xingu river in the Amazon.

The dam would flood a large area of land, dry up certain parts of the Xingu river, cause huge devastation to the rainforest and reduce fish stocks upon which the indigenous peoples in the area depend for their survival.

The construction of the dam would attract large numbers of migrant workers and colonists who are likely to bring diseases to the Indians, putting their lives at risk. Invasions of indigenous territories and violence would increase.

The livelihoods of thousands of tribal people who depend on the forest and river for food and water would be destroyed.

The Indians have not been properly consulted about the dam, in violation of Brazilian and international law.

FUNAI has said that uncontacted Indians may live in the area. They are most at risk. They have little or no resistance to outside diseases and the impacts of the dam could be fatal for them.

I call upon your Excellency to suspend plans to build the dam until and unless indigenous communities have given their free, prior and informed consent to it, and the land where the uncontacted Indians live has been officially recognized and protected.

Yours sincerely,

ALJAZEERA:
Brazil court approves building of Amazon dam

Click picture to see Aljazeera news article

Contentious Belo Monte dam project in the north to proceed without additional consultation with indigenous communities.

BRAZIL GOVT RENEWS DAM PERMIT …
In February, a court ordered the suspension of the dam project, citing environmental concerns.
Environmental group Amazon Watch has said that 80 per cent of the river is planned to be diverted for the dam, which would cause massive droughts and flooded forests.
The federal prosecutors' office in Para said in a statement it would go to the Supreme Court to appeal against the ruling.
"All the studies made arrive at the same conclusion: the dam will provoke drastic changes in the food chain and livelihood of the indigenous communities," the statement said.

The Internet Indians
Meet the tribe using the internet to tackle the logging mafias targeting their villages.
Click here to go to Aljazeera article

What more do you need before you start thinking?

And it doesn't end with damming alone: Logging, mining and oil corporations all play their part in the criminal business that destroys indigenous lives and an entire essential South American ecosystem.

The True Story of Chevron's Ecuador Disaster from Amazon Watch on Vimeo.

AND......

If you need more substantiated reasons why the damming of the Amazon should never even enter anyone's mind, click either dragon

Petition Links ~ Please take action, sign these petitions:

1 http://www.raoni.fr/signature-petition-against-belo-monte.php
2 http://www.survivalinternational.org/actnow/writealetter/madeira-dams
3 http://www.survivalinternational.org/actnow/writealetter/belo-monte
4 http://www.avaaz.org/en/belo_monte/?twi
5 http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_amazon_a/?rc=fb&pv=0
6 http://www.belomonte.org/petition/
7 http://www.thepetitionsite.com/26/Say-No-to-the-dam-of-Belo-Monte/
8 http://amazonwatch.org/take-action/stop-the-belo-monte-monster-dam
9 http://www.petitiononline.com/2207701/petition.html
10 http://www.change.org/petitions/save-the-rainforest-stop-the-belo-monte-dam-project
11 http://www.change.org/petitions/sign-the-petition-against-the-belo-monte-dam-project
12 http://www.change.org/petitions/brazil-to-build-controversial-belo-monte-hydroelectric-dam-in-amazon-rainforest-dont-build
13 http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-the-building-of-the-belo-monte-hydroelectric-dam.html
14 http://www.peticaopublica.com.br/PeticaoAssinar.aspx?pi=xingu
15 http://www.raoni.fr/signature-petition-against-belo-monte.php
16 http://www.thepetitionsite.com/4/stop-the-belo-monte-dam---save-the-rainforest/

PLEASE SHARE THIS PAGE

Share |

CHILDREN OF THE AMAZON UPDATE October 2012
CLICK HERE to go to Amazon Watch

AMAZONE WATCH WEB SITE

Condemn the Belo Monte Dam
There is more to this insane project. The Amazon is an essential breathing apparatus for the entire world. Take an interest in what provides your existence. Keep updated and continue to petition through these links.

Tribal Peoples The Book ~ Click image

The Web Site

The Book

Post Cards from the Amazon

The year is 2012 AD
Scribed recorded history has been traced back 8000 years. Archeology findings go back millions of years. The history of humanity tells its tale. We have learned to extract false promises from the truth. We have learned to exploit, abuse, destroy, and live a life of corruption, lies and deceit. We have gone so far that by now we believe in our own self defeating demise as prosperity. By all that has been there for billions of years, we have learned nothing. All we know is how to destroy and re-live the story of Sodom and Gomorrah to the full. In the unknown world live the few, fighting for their lives and for the well being of this Planet. On the premise of today's destruction, the greatest of all feared shocks before the regeneration of Life will take place, the party will end, the circus will collapse.

The GLOBAL CONSCIOUSNESS PROJECT

AFRICA

DR CONGO

NIGERIA

KENYA

November 25, 2011

The NOVEMBER 25 EVENT

November 25 International Global Consciousness Day - the day YOU decide to end world wide people, animal and environment destruction.

Click the poster and stand up for CHANGE on November 25, 2012

Next Page:
FRACKING AUSTRALIA
➧

Share |