Canadian Mining in Costa Rica: the Quaker Connection
Smiling with Wolf. I caught "Walking with Wolf" co-authors Wolf Guindon and Kay Chornook outside of the Monteverde Friends Meeting House on Sunday January 3rd, 2010.
Well, not so much a connection as much as an observation. Okay, there’s no real connection at all, but it makes a hell of a title.
I’m reading “Walking with Wolf,” about Wolf Guindon, one of the Quakers who came from Alabama to settle in Costa Rica’s Tilerán Mountain Range in 1951. The Quaker settlement became Monteverde, one of our planet’s most cherished & biologically diverse cloud forests (my wife and daughters live in Monteverde while I study at Upeace during the school year). Wolf’s co-author Kay Chornook set Wolf up with a small recording device back in the 90′s to document his thoughts as he roamed the network of footpaths above Monteverde. Once again, as I follow Wolf into the wilderness through his stories, Canadian mining companies meander back into the Dispatch from a Small Planet.
I’ve been writing about Canadian mining companies both here in Costa Rica and in Guatemala — they operate throughout the Americas.
"Walking with Wolf" is one well-told story after another. I'm learning a lot about the place I now call home: Monteverde. ~a.
In the mid 1960′s a Canadian company was exploring sulfur extraction at several “camps” in the Peñas Blancas region. Here’s the interesting part: they never started digging because as the Vietnam War was winding down it caused a glut in the price of sulfur. How’s that? Turns out the sulfur was being used as a defoliant. Yup, they stopped using Agent Orange and the price of sulfur plummeted.
Not only was the glut a good thing for the forests and people of Southeast Asia, but for the cloud forests on the eastern side of continental divide above Monteverde. The mines never happened and the forests were eventually bought by the Monteverde Conservation League and are now a part of the Children’s Eternal Rainforest — the largest privately owned reserve in Central America.
Canadian mining in Central America, however, is not ancient history: Urgent Action Needed Now
Less than a week ago a second anti-gold mine activist was assassinated in El Salvador. On the day after Christmas Dora Alicia Sorto Recinos, who was eight months pregnant, was assassinated in the community of Trinidad in the department of Cabañas. She was carrying her two-year old who was shot in the leg. Her husband is on the board of the Environmental Committee of Cabañas, organizing against Pacific Rim’s El Dorado gold mine and has survived three attacks on his life to date.
Urgent Action is needed: read the Rights Action alert now.
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year from Costa Rica! I filmed these adorable, little white-faced monkeys (& friends) over a half hour or so while on the Playa Manuel Antonio beach. They’re a great way to bring in 2010.
UNA first to go green?
A couple of days ago the rector of the Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica Olman Segura wrote an op/ed in La Nación concerning failures and semi-achievements at COP-15 in Copenhagen. The article was a fine overview of how our planet’s governments set non-binding, mediocre goals, but what caught my eye was the last graph about UNA being the first university in Costa Rica, and probably the first in Latin America, to be carbon neutral. Fascinating stuff, but what does that mean when he says the university has been certified?
Urgent Action: Assassination in El Salvador
Ramiro Rivera Gomez, assassinated on December 20th
This just in from Rights Action:
A CANADIAN MINING COMPANY (Pacific Rim)
MAKING A KILLING
IN EL SALVADOR … AGAIN
December 23, 2009
On December 20th, Ramiro Rivera Gomez was assassinated. He was vice-president of the Comité Ambiental de Cabañas (Environmental Committee of Cabañas). Rights Action has funded their work in favor of community development and environmental justice, against harmful openpit, cyanide bonding gold mining.
See “The Real News” report on the death of Marcelo Rivera in El Salvador, an assassination linked to the struggle against the harmful interests of Pacific Rim Mining Corp.
WHAT TO DO
WRITE TO PACIFIC RIM ASKING THEM:
- To renounce all intents to mine gold in El Salvador
- To drop their “law suit” proceeding via the World Bank to sue El Salvador for “lost profits” at this controversial gold mine in El Salvador
- To accept the establishment of a fully independent, international commission to carry out a complete investigation into this and previous repression and killings related to their gold mining interests in El Salvador
PACIFIC RIM
Toll Free: 1-888-775-7097
Tel: (604) 689-1976
E-mail: general@pacrim-mining.com
#1050 – 625 Howe Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada V6C 2T6
The Waiting Game
Have yourself a very merry, little Christmas…but if you’re a Costa Rican environmentalist it doesn’t look like Santa will be bringing any big gifts on “navidad.”
The Sala IV, Costa Rica’s Supreme Court most likely will not be delivering any decisions concerning Las Crucitas Gold Mine. Fifty-seven plaintiffs filed a constitutional injunction, naming President Oscar Arias and his Minister of Mines as defendants because in October 2008 the president declared the Crucitas Mine open for business. For 15 years the anti-mine movement has successfully kept Canadian-owned gold companies out the of the Crucitas area.
The mine is ready to go if the Supreme Court rules in favor of Infinity Gold, the most recent Canadian company to attempt to get gold out of two hills located only a few kilometers from the Nicaraguan border. A couple of posts ago I outlined a very brief history of Canadian-owned mines in the region.
While it is unclear which way the Supreme Court decide, the anti-mine movement is concerned…and for a number of good reasons.
First, back in September the President of the Supreme Court Luis Paulino Mora and a magistrate Ana Virginia Calzada visited the mine and spoke only to the mining company — they kept the environmentalists away using a sizable police presence. Environmentalists asked the court to annul the visit. The magistrates are to erase the visit from their memories??
Another reason to be concerned — the government will not show up to debates and the decision-making process has been anything but transparent. In a recent interview I conducted with anti-mine activist and University of Costa Rica international law professor, Nicolas Boeglin, he said that government embraces Infinity Gold’s talking points. As Mr. Boeglin pointed out, “there are things that are said that do not correspond to the scientific knowledge that we have of the region or the legal knowledge we have in Costa Rica…it’s one thing one the company says this, but when the top officials of the country repeat it, like Macaws…or parrots, something wrong is happening.”
While the Supreme Court should announce a decision 30 days after hearing ended on November 17th, rumor has it that we won’t hear anything until after the presidential election at the end January. Certainly, they weren’t about announce anything while Copenhagen is going on — Costa Rica has an image to uphold.
So, if you are a anti-mine activist, have yourself a merry, little Christmas. But don’t stay up too late waiting for Santa.
Follow the words…
Call me naive, but actions sometimes follow words.
In spite of all of its environmental shortcomings, Costa Rica, from time to time, will come up with policies that make sense. According to a press release by the NGO “Peace with Nature,” half of Costa Rica’s 83 public institutions are “environmentalized” (no, that’s not a word in English, but an interesting translation from “ambientada”). More importantly, embedded in the press release are strategies for Costa Rica to head down the path towards sustainability.
President Oscar Arias’ self-created NGO “Peace with Nature” has drafted environmental guidelines that all government agencies must meet by obligation. The “Environmental Guidelines” outline efficient use of 1) energy, 2) waste, 3) water, as well as 4) the reductions of emissions. Those are the words. Will the actions follow?
Maybe. In addition to the Environmental Guidelines, each of the country’s 83 public institutions must turn in an “Environmental Impact Plan” outlining how they will become more efficient in the short, medium and long run. So far, according to “Peace with Nature,” 42 institutions are already “ambientadas.” What does that mean? It doesn’t mean that they’ve gone green, but at least 42 institutions now have a plan.
In spite of the big-box,huge-hotel, environmentally-weak type of development the country has chosen year after year, Costa Rica does create “release valves” that blow off pent-up steam (ie the courts will send ex-presidents to jail). Will the new guidelines help blow off enough steam…probably not to truly reach “Peace with Nature.” However, it’s a start.
Crucitas at a Crossroads
I’ve been following Canadian mining companies throughout Central America over the past couple of weeks — a big thanks to my Upeace professor Guntra Asitara and entire “Social Movements” class. We’ve been knee deep in mud and neck deep in first hand accounts of the proposed “Las Crucitas Gold Mine” in northern Costa Rica — we spent an afternoon touring the proposed mine on December 5th. After 15 years of struggle between environmentalists and a series of Canadian mining companies, sometime in January the Costa Rican Supreme Court is expected to hand down a decision that will determine the fate of the mine.
All smiles. Or are we? This is our delegation from the University for Peace that visited the Crucitas Mine on December 5th. I'm to the far right next to the Infinity Gold administrators.
This post is just a quick overview of Canadian mining in Central America which have operations in Chiapas, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. In fact, there’s probably not a country in the American Hemisphere without a Canadian company digging for something, somewhere.
I’ve been particularly concerned about Guatemala at the Marlin Gold Mine up near San Miguel Ixtauhacán and the Hudbay Nickel Mine in the eastern part of the country. As in so many situations in Guatemala, opposing the mining operations will cost your life. Want to anything and everything on Canadian mining in Central America? Just visit Rights Action, a Canadian-based human rights organization.
People in San Miguel are putting up a fight against the Marlin Gold Mine, accusing them of leaking cyanide into the water and causing quite nasty skin diseases. Be warned, the photos are not pretty. Rights Action has been doing great work informing the world with contacts at the BBC.
I haven’t been to San Miguel, though I did work with many San Miguel migrant workers in Indiantown, Florida, just east of Lake Okeechobee. They were very kind to me as I went to pick green peppers with them in 1987. I was quite a slow picker in the two days I spent with them, so they dubbed me “huevón,” a not-so-flattering term for my lethargic picking skills — but we got along great. As I was traveling by bicycle through Central America, I would occasionally stop to meet interesting people with fascinating stories. Never thought we’d cross paths over a gold mine.
Much more to follow.
Screwed?
Costa Rica is prepping for the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen -COP15- early next month. I spoke with German Obando, the chief scientist for Fundecor, the local NGO that is responsible for implementing the country’s PES (Payment for Environmental Services) program. The idea of PES programs is simple: pay forest owners a fair market value to make it more lucrative to keep forests than cut them down. Costa Rica’s PES program is blazing away new trails for what may become the centerpiece at COP15: a global PES program called REDD, or reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. In spite of its local success, will the Costa Rican model be a victim of its own demise?
Obando is concerned. Since REDD money will be based on selling carbon credits, polluting countries must buy credits from developing nations to stem deforestation. Here’s the problem: Costa Rica’s been working on this for more than 10 years and has essentially arrested deforestation.
Costa Rica is heading into COP15 very cautiously – will they be recognized for their trail blazing work? Instead of getting money to halt deforestation through REDD (credits are cheap according to Obando at about $5 USD per ton of carbon), can they get clean mechanism credits at $20-25 a pop? Can they get money not to halt deforestation but to modernize antiquated bus systems, develop wind power, a new electrical grid, etc?
How creative will REDD be? Or will it, in traditional government style, penalize good behavior and reward bad?
A little help over here…
I’m not sure how I missed this one two weeks ago, but one of the biggest Rockstars of environmental justice in Costa Rica, José Lino Chávez, the President of the Tribunal Ambiental Administrativo (TAA)…or as I call them the Environmental Criminal Court…made a desperate plea to the Costa Rican people in a La Nación op/ed.
Don't fool yourself -- this is one of Costa Rica's biggest Rockstars. José Lino Chávez of the TAA...the Environmental Criminal Court.
As reported in the Dispatch, the Costa Rican Congress is attempting to push through reforms to strengthen the TAA. In his November 3rd Op/Ed Sr. Lino Chávez clearly laid out what is at stake if this reform does not pass: a much weaker environmental policing in which eco-bullies get away with everything they get away with. Reading through the Dispatch about hotels tearing up mangroves, highway contractors polluting aquifers, and agrochemical runoff contaminating rivers and making people sick…somebody’s got to stop these guys.
The TAA has been that somebody.
The TAA needs long-term appointments in which their jobs are not based on political winds or because of difficult calls they make to stop bullies. They need the might to shut down shut down operations and keep the bullies from beating up the natural environment — the new bill in Congress says they can do that for as little as six months and as much as three years. These are concrete proposals that are on the floor of the Costa Rican Congress right now in a bill called the “The Law to Strengthen the Environmental Court.”
Sr. Lino Chávez pointed out that reports of environmental abuse are up 50% in 2008 over the previous year. Doesn’t he and his team deserve the tools they need take on the growing challenges?
State of the Nation: Agriculture in Costa Rica
Pineapple is a agrochemical intensive crop...and yet so sweet!
Recently, the 15th annual “State of the Nation Report on Sustainable Human Development” was released. The Dispatch is providing a series of short analysis concerning the “Harmony with Nature” section. Today, the state of Costa Rican agriculture.
Costa Rica works with 2944 types of pesticides and yet it has only 8746 hectares of land dedicated to organic farming. That’s comparable to a large, but not a mega-sized farm. Actually, 8746 hectares in some countries is quite small. So, let’s compare that to pineapple with 40-50,000 hectares in cultivation in Costa Rica.
According to the report, pineapple has been a real threat to people’s health and the natural environment. Because it is a mono-crop, it is not suitable for tropical cultivation and “requires a continual application of agrochemicals.” Last week I took a trip up to the pineapple country (Sarapiqui) and observed the huge extensions of crops and trucks applying chemicals. More importantly than observation, Costa Rica’s Environmental Criminal Court has shut major plantations down because runoff of agrochemicals were making people sick downstream.
What is the state doing to monitor the large scale application of insecticides and fertilizers? Not much. According to the report, Costa Rica does not systematically analyze chemical residuals found on vegetables. Second, the Ministry of Health, Agriculture and Environment does not have information to establish criteria to reduce chemical exposure on ecosystems. Third, the Ministry does not follow up on reports that identify the areas most affected by intoxication and fourth, the sparse data they do get is not analyzed.
