Green Options » colonialism

Neo-Colonial Land Grab Threatens Small Scale Farmers in Africa

Bryan Nelson — Tue, 12 May 2009 09:55:44 +0000

Rich countries and firms are currently purchasing massive amounts of land in developing African nations to be used for the production of food and biofuel.

Many of the agricultural dealings are being called “murky”, as small scale, local farmers and native pastoralists are increasingly being pushed aside to make room for large agri-industrial estates connected to far off markets.

Korea’s Daewoo Leases an Area Half of the Size of Belgium in Madagascar for Free

Amiel Blajchman — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 19:41:15 +0000

According to a few under-the-radar reports, Korea’s industrial conglomerate Daewoo has just completed a deal with Madagascar for a 99 year lease of an area half the size of Belgium (about 1.3 million hectares). While complete terms of the lease are not yet available, the total price is: NOTHING.

The initial plan is to plant maize and palm oil for export to South Korea. The benefit to Madagascar of losing a little over half of their arable land would be the anticipated employment opportunities for farmers and other locals.

According to a Daewoo spokesperson:

We want to plant corn there to ensure our food security. Food can be a weapon in this world,” said Hong Jong-wan, a manager at Daewoo. “We can either export the harvests to other countries or ship them back to Korea in case of a food crisis.
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Red, Green & Blue: Eco-Tourism or “Green” Colonialism?

Shirley Siluk Gregory — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 12:53:21 +0000

You know, just 10 years ago, few vacations sounded as thrilling to me as an "eco-vacation." Maybe two weeks in a rustic part of Costa Rica on the lookout for wild scarlet, green-wing and blue-and-gold macaws squawking in the trees, flocking to claylicks or just soaring through the warm, moist tropical air from one spot to another. Or, though I’m not the cold-weather-type, cruising along the Alaskan coast to drink in the astounding, other-worldly beauty of natural blue ice 10 stories high, majestic snow-capped peaks and, possibly, even the rare thrill of spotting a polar bear doing its thing in the wild.

But now, a decade later, I’m far more conflicted. Yes, eco-tourism has helped lift many marginal or struggling indigenous communities out of poverty or hopelessness. Even in parts of the developed world, such as the Florida coast where I live, tourism brings a bounty of dollars and, as a result, a more-vibrant, liveable community for the locals as well. But a travel-based economy is a double-edged sword.

Even beyond the negative echoes of colonialism and cultural arrogance some types of travel might conjure up, there’s a far darker aspect to eco-tourism today: the possibility that sincere, well-meaning travelers who seek only to benefit a fragile environment or a developing community are actually causing, in the long term, more harm than good. Primate groups managed so as to be viewed more conveniently "in the wild" are stressed to the point of infanticide, while the very notion of "global-warming-based tours" seems nothing less than perverse. Plus, the whole notion of offsetting the carbon emissions damage of your vacation has, I think, been fairly effectively discredited: there’s no free lunch and there’s no carbon-free globe-trotting either.

So what’s the answer? I’m not sure. Few experiences are more illuminating than a first-person glimpse into an exotic, even threatened, locale, and such encounters can go a long way toward encouraging those with means to help make meaningful changes for those without. But the thought of cruise ship after cruise ship anchoring off the coast of Greenland to let travelers watch ice sheets melt is, to me, abhorrent. Rather than taking a strong stance here, I’m more interested in hearing how others view this environmental Hydra facing the world’s most privileged.

What’s your take?