Hundreds of families in the northeastern state of Bahia vacated the eucalyptus plantation of a major Brazilian wood-pulp producer Thursday after being assured they would be compensated with land.
SAO PAULO, Brazil — Hundreds of families in the northeastern state of Bahia vacated the eucalyptus plantation of a major Brazilian wood-pulp producer Thursday after being assured they would be compensated with land, the government's agrarian reform agency said.
Armed police troops had been deployed on a judge's order to evict the families, but negotiations initiated by the agency convinced the landless peasants to peacefully leave the property, Bahia state police chief Antonio Jorge Ribeiro de Santana said by telephone.
"We didn't have to do anything to force them out," Santana said. "They left on their own."
On April 16, some 400 families, organized by the Landless Rural Workers Movement, or MST, invaded the 600-hectare (1,480-acre) plantation owned by Suzano Papel e Celulose SA in Teixeira de Freitas, located 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) northeast of Sao Paulo.
They uprooted about 200,000 eucalyptus saplings and used some to build 850 shacks that served as temporary shelters, MST organizer Evanildo Costa said by cell phone shortly after leaving the plantation. They also started planting corn and beans, he said.
The MST conducts high-profile, organized invasions of land it deems unproductive to pressure the government to speed up its land reform program.
Under Brazil's 1988 Constitution, unproductive land may be expropriated as long as the owner is compensated.
On Thursday morning, about 1,500 men, women and children set up their shacks along a highway three kilometers (two miles) from the plantation, where they will await their relocation, Costa said.
"If they don't find a place for us, we will go back to the plantation," he said.
Katia Vasco, a spokeswoman for the land reform agency, or Incra, said the agency would accelerate land reform in the sprawling state. She did not elaborate.
Suzano Papel e Celulose said in a statement Wednesday that it was not part of the negotiations, preferring to deal with state authorities "to prevent the situation from getting out of control." It did not immediately return calls seeking comment Thursday.
The company is one of the largest producers of eucalyptus pulp and paper in Latin America, cultivating eucalyptus trees on 184,000 hectares (455,000 acres).
This was the second time in two months that the MST has targeted major Brazilian pulp producers, who use large tracts of land to grow trees that are turned into pulp and paper products.
Eucalyptus trees suck up water and nutrients in the soil and contaminate neighboring plots of land, Costa said.
"This farm is an example of the eucalyptus monoculture ... that is creating a green desert," he said.
Brazil has one of the world's most uneven distributions of land, with 3.5 percent of landowners holding 56 percent of the arable land. The poorest 40 percent own a scant 1 percent. The MST wants Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to accelerate his efforts to redistribute land to the poor.
Source: Associated Press
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