Monoculture Tree Plantations Negatively Impact Women’s Lives
In honor of International Women’s Day on March 8th, a global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women, the World Rainforest Movement (WRM) and Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) have released three new case studies and a video on the impacts of monoculture tree plantations on women in Nigeria, Papua New Guinea and Brazil.
These tree plantations provide rubber for car and bus tires, palm oil for processed foods and pulp for toilet paper - all items being used in the west. They are also destroying local communities according to WRM and FoEI.
In the case of Nigeria, in 2007, the French tire maker Michelin came in to the Iguóbazuwa Forest Reserve, a biologically diverse region supplying food for around 20,000 people. Michelin bulldozed the forest and local farm lands to convert them into rubber plantations. Women living there lost their subsistence farms and the local forest which provided medicinal herbs and plants.
