UNBELIEVABLE!!! POLITICIAN PROPOSAL TO MINING IN 10 % OF PROTECTED AREAS IN THE AMAZON

[Reproduced from www.amazon.org.br]

It is well known that mining is an activity that causes highly negative impacts.

Deforestation caused by gold mining in the Amazon Forest

The author of the proposal (a deputy from Amapá state) says  that a large number of these units, especially in the Amazon, were created on land with great mining potential  and that the activity would help reduce the national indices of poverty.

After all, as it is explained by  Jean Timmers (superintendent of    Public Policy of WWF-BRASIL),  protected areas were created to protect biodiversity, water sources and other environmental services. Many protected areas are home to just rare or unique portions of Brazilian nature. And he added:  "The project is more an attack on the National System of conservation units, because it distorts the basic function of integral protection areas, which is to protect as full as possible the diversity of our natural heritage".

Danger in sight: the Brazilian congressmen discuss a constitutional amendment (PEC 215/2000), which grants exclusive jurisdiction to Congress to approve the creation of protected areas, the demarcation of indigenous lands and territories "quilombolas"  (= descendents of Afro-Brazilian slaves).