Brazil’s Amazonian initiative
Editorial
Stabroek News
August 23, 2002
When Osmar Vladimir Chohfi, Secretary General of Brazil’s Ministry of External Affairs, visited Georgetown last April he suggested that, once SIVAM got underway, countries such as Guyana which were signatories to the Treaty of Amazonian Co-operation could benefit from the resources and facilities of that project.
That time has come.
In the last week of July, Brazil’s President Fernando Henrique Cardoso flew into Manaus to inaugurate the Amazon Surveillance System (Sistema de Vigilancia da Amazonia - SIVAM) and its mother project, the Amazon Protection System (Sistema de Protecao da Amazonia - SIPAM). Should Takuba Lodge press Itamaraty to realise Osmar Chohfi’s generous gesture, Guyana could think of starting to plan the orderly development of the Cuyuni-Mazaruni, Potaro-Siparuni and Upper Takutu-Upper Essequibo Regions which abut Brazil’s Amazon with the help of SIVAM’S high technology within SIPAM’s thoroughness.
For the past ten years or so, Brazil has been constructing the US$1.4 billion projects that have now become the most advanced system to be found anywhere in the world, as a means of enforcing Brazilian sovereignty and protection over the Amazon region.
SIVAM consists of a network of fixed and mobile radar stations for gathering environmental, weather and other data and is aimed at controlling, checking, monitoring and safeguarding the region, and expanding and improving communication. The data generated by SIVAM’s technology will then enable SIPAM to provide environmental surveillance; supervise the electromagnetic spectrum; control the occupation and use of land; monitor and control epidemic disease; detect and combat illegal activities; supervise and control aviation and fluvial navigation; and support research for the sustainable development of the region.
Brazil’s Amazon is about the size of Western Europe but it is more than merely a large portion of national territory. It is a valuable human and global asset and heritage of all mankind. Its rainforests constitute one third of all remaining forests on the planet; are home to 30 per cent of the planet’s gene pool making it the largest natural source of pharmaceutical, biochemical and agronomic products; and occupy the world’s largest freshwater basin. But, for some years, the Amazon has also become the target of a wide range of problems such as rampant deforestation, illegal mining, narcotics-trafficking; environmental degradation and epidemic disease.
Guyana’s hinterland has been especially vulnerable to the spillover effects of these abuses. Fatal aviation accidents have occurred all too frequently in the Cuyuni-Mazaruni, requiring ‘search-and-rescue’ operations which are beyond Guyana’s capability; garimpeiros enter, work, remove gold and diamonds and leave the Potaro-Siparuni at will; the Rupununi was the scene of the murderous ranchers’ rebellion in 1969; unlicenced arms and ammunition are imported; animal diseases spread, willy-nilly; and aircraft transport cocaine by night, some occasionally crashing on the numerous airstrips and long stretches of roadway.
Development of much of the hinterland, so far away from the rice fields, sugar plantations and voting population of the coastland, has traditionally attracted little attention from the Central Government. The balata, cattle, mining, timber, tourism and other industries were left largely to private endeavour.
Law enforcement is almost laughable, with much of the territory falling under a single Guyana Police Force division. The Guyana Defence Force’s presence is limited to few locations. ‘Rangers’ from the Guyana Forestry Commission, Guyana Geology and Mines Commission and the Ministry of Health’s Vector (mosquito) Control Division, and representatives of Civil Aviation and other agencies find it difficult to move around the vast area.
But crime, disease, environmental damage and natural disasters now have a transnational character and the old laissez-faire methods of governing are no longer good enough. Guyana has shown scant capacity to exploit new technologies for its own hinterland security and economic development.
It would also be a naïve mistake for Guyana to assume that Brazil itself, and the USA (where the Raytheon Company which executed the contract for the surveillance system is based), do not have geopolitical interests in controlling such an important global asset as the Amazon. The Guyana Government would be well advised to pay attention to what is happening on its longest frontier.
The inauguration of SIVAM - the world’s most advanced surveillance system - provides yet another opportunity for Guyana to take a serious step to control its valuable hinterland resources.