Auctioning Off Peru's Rainforest

I heard on BBC's radio newshour this morning about an Auction going on among US Oil and Gas companies - selling off parts of Peru's rainforest. There were indigenous people there from Peru protesting - saying that their land is not for sale.

I did a google search and came up with some old stories that are related...

From 2002: Texas Firms Line Up U.S. Aid in Peru

Two Texas energy companies, both closely tied to the Bush White House, are lining up administration support for nearly $900 million in public financing for a Peruvian natural gas project that will cut through one of the world's most pristine tropical rain forests.

A top priority of Peruvian officials, who view it as key to energy independence, the Camisea project has encountered fierce opposition. Worldwide environmental groups and some members of Congress argue that the massive extraction and pipeline project will destroy the rain forest and the lifestyle of its indigenous people.

The project backers' quest for financial support from U.S. development banks will test the political pull of the Texas companies, Hunt Oil Co. and Halliburton Co., which have longstanding ties to the Bush-Cheney administration and the Republican Party. Next month, Hunt Vice President Steve Suellentrop is set to accompany Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans on a trade mission to Peru, where President Bush traveled in March to promote Andean trade.

International consortia, led by Dallas-based Hunt, Argentina's Pluspetrol and Peru's Tecgas, began work earlier this year on the $1.6 billion project in the southeastern part of Peru's Amazon basin. Hunt brought in Halliburton's Kellogg Brown & Root unit to engineer a proposed next phase, a $1 billion plant from which Hunt hopes to export liquid natural gas to the United States by 2006...

President Alejandro Toledo, during a recent U.S. trip, called the gas project "vital" to the financial rehabilitation of Peru, which has more than $30 billion in foreign debt. Officials say it will cut energy costs, replace dirtier fuels, provide jobs and boost tax revenue....

From a year ago: Peru's Amazon oil deals denounced

Environmental and human rights group in Peru have denounced the government's campaign to auction off large swathes of the Amazon to oil and gas companies.

They say the amount of Peruvian Amazon territory open to exploration has risen from 13% to 70% in two years.

They say this is putting at risk the biodiversity of the Amazon and the lives of indigenous people.

Peruvian President Alan Garcia has said the plans are part of his investment programme to tackle widespread poverty.

At a time when scientists have emphasised the importance of the Amazon as the vanguard against catastrophic climate change, the government of Peru is selling off its tropical forest to oil companies at an exponential rate.

Environmental and human rights groups in Peru say this will devastate large tracts of pristine rainforest and the native communities that live there.

And 2 months ago: Banks to Vote on Funding for Huge Project in Peru's Rainforest

On December 19, the Board of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) plans to vote on $400 million in direct loans and up to $500 million in "B" loans for the largest investment in the history of Peru: Hunt Oil’s massive and controversial liquefied natural gas (LNG) project known as Camisea II, or “Peru LNG.” It has raised serious environmental and social concerns, particularly for its effect on indigenous peoples living in the region.

The project, expected to be funded jointly by the IDB, World Bank Group and U.S. Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im), connects to a natural gas pipeline that runs from Peru’s Camisea gas fields, currently being developed in an environmentally sensitive area of the Amazon rainforest.

A recent economic analysis shows that Camisea II is very likely to make Peru worse off economically. The analysis is from Harvard economist Glenn Jenkins.

Jenkins's initial analysis concludes that when the country's current and future needs are considered, having to import additional petroleum in the future will cost the country more than it is likely to benefit from LNG exports. Peru would need much greater gas reserves for LNG exports to be economically beneficial for the country, and unless these additional reserves are proven, exporting liquefied natural gas is likely to make Peru worse off.

Despite the negative economic, social and environmental impacts that this project will cause in Peru, the World Bank/IFC, IDB and Ex-Im are slated to give over $1 billion in publicly backed resources (mostly development aid money) to the project, beginning with the IDB vote this Wednesday....