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PERU: Amazonian Communities Fight New Oil Wells

Emad Mekay

WASHINGTON, Feb 2 2007 (IPS) - Conservation groups are warning international investors that a Peruvian government offer to explore for oil in pristine Amazon land is fraught with risks, lacks community support and violates international laws protecting indigenous communities.

The warnings come as Peruvian executives from the state-controlled company Perupetro are in the U.S. city of Houston, Texas as part of an international tour to tender 18 oil concessions and invite U.S. companies to invest in the Peruvian Amazon forest.

Perupetro, Peru&#39s state-owned oil company which is responsible for promoting the investment of hydrocarbon exploration in the South American country, is promoting its 2007 bidding round at a road show in Houston that coincides with the NAPE Expo, the oil prospecting industry&#39s semi-annual trade show.

According to Perupetro&#39s website, the company is tendering 18 blocks, 11 of them Amazonian blocks, covering approximately 22 million acres of highly bio-diverse, intact primary tropical rainforest.

Peruvian authorities say they hope to capitalise on rising global energy demand to bring economic growth to some of the country&#39s most impoverished regions.

But environmental and human rights groups say the new development would put indigenous communities and the environment there in jeopardy, and that the negative impacts would more than likely offset the expected benefits.

"This whole process is being done in a way that&#39s not following national Peruvian law or international protocols in terms of respecting the rights of indigenous people," Maria Ramos of the environmental group Amazon Watch told IPS.

"Most of the blocks overlap over indigenous land and protected areas of people in voluntary isolation," she said.

Amazon Watch is joining Peruvian groups and other international organisations in voicing concerns about the possible unintended economic and environmental consequences facing indigenous people in the Peruvian Amazon.

Indigenous advocates say that these highly vulnerable populations have no immunity to many diseases introduced by outsiders, and believe that their physical as well as cultural existence could be gravely threatened by oil exploration.

"In compliance with international human rights legal instruments and out of respect for basic human decency, these concessions should not be allowed in areas inhabited by isolated indigenous peoples," said Lily la Torre, who directs the Peruvian group Racimos de Ungurahui.

The new blocks of concessions mean that nearly three-quarters of the Peruvian Amazon, one of the largest areas of tropical rainforest anywhere in the world, would be turned over for oil extraction.

"Now 70 percent of the Peruvian Amazon is in oil blocks without any look at the current and past impacts and there&#39s no planning for the future," Matt Finer of Save America&#39s Forests told IPS from Houston.

"We are here with the message that enough is enough, calling for suspension of this new round, a) until there&#39s some analysis of the impacts of the blocks before, and b) before offering any new blocks there&#39s some sort of regional and long-term analysis of what this all means to the biodiversity," he said.

Human rights groups report that oil companies operating in the Amazon region in the past left forests scarred by roads, polluted air and rivers contaminated with daily discharges of millions of gallons of toxic waste in their wake.

Indigenous leaders themselves are also trying to preempt Perupetro&#39s plans. They followed the Peruvian company officials here to the United States to try to spread the word about the problems the concessions would create. They say they want the company to abandon its plans for now.

"So the folks from Peru are here to talk to directly not only to Perupetro but also to potential investors about the risks of investing, which are community opposition, operational risks, financial risks because they will not have community support when the companies go and operate on their land," said Ramos.

Conservation groups contend that for none of the blocks up for auction has Perupetro obtained free, prior and informed consent, an internationally recognised benchmark intended to protect the rights of indigenous communities whose lives and lands stand to be affected by extractive projects such as oil drilling.

Forest conservation and indigenous people protection remain one of the top priorities for environmental groups.

The groups fighting the project in the Peruvian Amazon include AIDESEP, Peru&#39s national indigenous Amazonian federation; Derechos, Ambiente y Recursos; Racimos de Ungurahui; and Accion Ciudadana Camisea, a coalition of 10 local civil society organisations.

"The Peruvian state should guarantee the territory and land rights of indigenous peoples. Currently, there is a lack of political will. We don&#39t want petroleum concessions that will impact our lives, environment and culture," said Robert Guimaraes, AIDESEP vice president, in a statement sent to IPS.

The government is also faulted for not consulting with local communities or regional authorities.

Indigenous peoples in Peru, including isolated populations, are also threatened by another natural gas development, the highly controversial Camisea Natural Gas Project, that is designed to gain access to 11 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and more than 600 million barrels of liquid petroleum gas.