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ARGENTINA: Alternative Nobel Winner Decries ‘Environmental Masquerading’

Francesca Colombo* - Tierramérica

BUENOS AIRES, Oct 21 2004 (IPS) - Argentine biologist Raúl Montenegro has been tapped for the Right Livelihood Award, known as the ”Alternative Nobel Prize”, in recognition of his ”outstanding and wide-ranging work with local communities and indigenous peoples to protect the environment and conserve natural resources in Latin America and elsewhere.”

The prize, whose name refers to the principle that ”each person should follow an honest occupation”, recognises those who provide practical answers to major contemporary problems. It was founded in 1980 and includes an award of 268,000 dollars. Montenegro is to receive it in a December ceremony in the Swedish Parliament.

Montenegro is a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Córdoba, in central Argentina, and president of that province’s Environmentalist Foundation, or FUNAM. He has dedicated his life to anti-nuclear activities, creating protected nature areas, fighting chemical contamination, combating deforestation, and protecting water resources.

The biologist has worked in Latin American and African countries, as well as India, and says he learned in his travels that knowledge is to be found closer to the earth, beyond the city lights.

In 1992 the activist received the Austrian Nuclear-Free Future Award; in 1989 the Global 500 prize from the United Nations; and in 1971 the scientific research award given by the University of Buenos Aires.

Montenegro spoke with Tierramérica recently in the Argentine capital:

– What does receiving the Alternative Nobel mean to you? – It is an international pat on the back for the soul. When one experiences so many struggles, many of them difficult and fruitless, and one receives so many threats and pressures, the prize is like a shield that I can be thankful for and enjoy.

TA: What are the leading environmental problems in Argentina?

RM: Corruption, inept officials, and the selfishness of companies and of many citizens. The result is a country that has increasingly less natural environment, and more and more contamination. More than 80 percent of the native forests have been destroyed. There is no environmental management; there is environmental masquerading.

TA: The Mbya tekoa yma and Tekoa kapii yuate indigenous communities have been thrown off their lands in the Yabotí reserve, in Misiones province (northeast), by private companies that are logging hundred-year-old trees and destroying habitat. What has FUNAM achieved in defence of these communities?

RM: A great deal, but not enough. It has revealed the four leading culprits in that silent genocide: the Mocomá Forestal company, Misiones’ Governor Carlos Rovira, Ecology Minister Luis Jacobo and director of Guaraní affairs Arnulfo Verón. FUNAM won a yearlong moratorium on tree extraction, though it isn’t strictly enforced, and it established that (indigenous) communities must be made owners of the territories where they live.

TA: Is it possible to halt the genocide and the chainsaws with e-mail and fax campaigns like FUNAM is conducting?

RM: Yes, because their impact is tremendous. Governments fear this sort of international pressure and the publicity of how they are responsible (for environmental problems).

TA: Another FUNAM campaign calls for a ban on the hunting and trade of iguanas. Has that produced results?

RM: We won for an undetermined amount of time an end to hunting without quotas. We also publicised ties between the governor of Córdoba, Eduardo Angeloz, and La Unión tannery. The scandal and the subsequent bankruptcy of the firm led to a drastic reduction in iguana hunting.

TA: In 1994 FUNAM was in Guatemala to fight the construction of a Canadian nuclear reactor. What was that experience like?

RM: Outstanding. We explained to the national environmental agency the risks of that reactor, and we convinced them to take a stance against its entry into the country. Years later we led a similar campaign in Zimbabwe and they shelved an initiative to buy an Argentine nuclear reactor.

TA: Why do you say that FUNAM is ”truly a Third World organisation”?

RM: Because we work without pay, and with ridiculously low budgets. In 23 years we have hardly used any external funds. Despite our limited financial capacity, we are a headache for many governments and corporations. But the communities respect us.

TA: Must an academic like you have his feet ”in the dirt” in order to achieve change?

RM: It’s important, but also to know how to step out when one is always in touch with the ground. I bring the technical tools to the community, but also in the field I obtain ideas and knowledge that is important for academia. Ivory towers are as dangerous as getting down to the dirt. The challenge is to have humility and to never stop learning.

(* Francesca Colombo is a Tierramérica contributor. Originally published Oct. 16 by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme.)