Rainforest destruction and tribal interests conflict with development. Photo: Orvarati (flickr)

One of the world’s last uncontacted tribes was photographed this week from a helicopter flying over the Amazon rainforest, near the Brazil-Peru border. The photos were taken by the Brazilian government’s Indian Affairs Department to, “show the [tribes’] houses, to show they are there… This is very important because there are some who doubt their existence.”

Proof that this tribe exists complicates the current battle between those who want to conserve the Amazon and those who want to develop it. Even though they've not been contacted before, these tribes are a casualty of the forest battle.

Currently, the Indian Affairs Department guesses there are about 500 uncontacted Indians living on the Brazil side of the border. However, as previously uncontacted tribes in Peru have tried unsuccessfully to defend their territory from loggers, they have been systematically killed and forced to move across the border.

This migration is a problem not only for the tribes losing their traditional homeland, but also for the uncontacted tribes who are already living in Brazil. The Indian affairs department of Brazil predicts more violence in the area, not only between tribes and loggers, but between tribes now living in the same territory.

Contacted tribes in both Brazil and Peru have been active in attempting to prevent further intrusion into the rainforest. Brazilian Indians are holding a mass rally this week in Altamira, protesting the series of dams the government wants to build on the Xingu River. They say that they have not been included in the decision making process, even though the dams would essentially destroy their way of life. Kayapó Indian leader Raoni, sent a defiant letter to Brazil’s President Lula vowing to stop the construction. He also protests the government's violations of indigenous rights enshrined in Brazil's 1988 Constitution.

The conflict over the rainforest is not confined to regional politics. In Peru, a French company is being sued by an Amazon Indian organization, AIDESEP, in an attempt to prevent drilling for oil nearby the border area where the uncontacted tribes were just photographed. AIDESEP asserts that Perenco, a U.S. company recently taken over by French owners, should be prohibited from working in the area and contacting any tribes.

Any contact with the tribes could be catastrophic. The recently contacted Murunahua tribe by the Yurua river watched half of their members die from disease, a mortality rate common in recently contacted tribes.

Despite the danger to the tribes, and international law that acknowledges the uncontacted tribes as the rightful owners of their land, Perenco is currently expanding into these areas.

José Carlos dos Reis Meirelles Júnior, head of the Indian Protection post near the Peru border says, "What is happening in this region is a monumental crime against the natural world, the tribes, the fauna and is further testimony to the complete irrationality with which we, the ‘civilized’ ones, treat the world."

Photo: Deforestation in Mato Grosso, a major soybean growing region in Brazil leoffreita (flickr)

The woman known as the “guardian angel” of the world’s biggest rainforest has called it quits.

Marina Silva cited "the growing resistance found by our team in important sectors of the government and society" in stepping down as Brazil’s environment minister. Environmentalists saw her as a key ally in defending the Amazon.

Silva’s resignation is but one in a series of foreboding events in the face of increasing deforestation. Despite three years of decline, deforestation accelerated in the Brazilian Amazon during the last half of 2007. Land conversion pressures are attributed to soaring prices and demand for soy and beef exports. Brazil’s ascent to an agricultural superpower and its steady, 5-percent economic growth has stimulated hydroelectric dams, roads and other infrastructure projects.

The environmental effects of Amazonian destruction have global consequences. Deforestation not only threatens the existence of the indigenous populations who have lived in the Amazon for millennia, but also irreversibly damages a region of unparalleled biodiversity. Deforestation also exacerbates global warming. According to mongabay, an environmental news site:

… the country is ranked as the world's fourth-largest emitter of greenhouse gases due largely to deforestation and forest degradation, which account for 70 percent of its total greenhouse gas emissions.

Despite the global importance of the Amazon, Brazil’s president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has made it clear that an international debate on the Amazon's fate is unwelcome.

This week, President Lula declared: "The Brazilian Amazon has an owner, and that owner is the Brazilian people.” He acknowledged conservationists' concerns but stressed the need to use the resources of the Amazon forest, which makes up two-thirds of the country’s territory.

If Brazil insists on framing the Amazon as a domestic issue, perhaps the best hope for conservation lies with the people who inhabit it. Construction of the Belo Monte dam — which would be one of the world's largest hydroelectric power plants, after China's Three Gorges and the Itaipu dam shared by Brazil and Paraguay and would also threatens severe ecological and social damage — gathered more than 1,000 environmental activists and Indians protesters in Altamira last week.

Nineteen years ago, a similar dam project was successfully defeated after being met with international condemnation. With today’s rate of deforestation and economic pressures, however, the future of the Amazon looks grim. The actions of both President Lula and Marina Silva lead us to one conclusion: in Brazil, economic growth trumps environmental protection.

Struggling fishing communities Brazil may have found a way to turn their economic troubles around. A university there has set up a fishermen's cooperative to introduce oyster farming in the area and boost economic development. The advantages of oyster farming go beyond economics — the industry can increase biodiversity and water-filtration services.

Even as the global market looks increasingly unsteady, China's economy continues to boom. It has already become apparent that this rapid growth is contributing to increasing income inequality.

The Financial Times argues that China should learn from Brazil by combatting economic inequality with more social spending on things like health care and education.

The BBC reports that the Brazilian government has unveiled a new anti-poverty plan that, if approved, will provide millions of dollars towards the creation of jobs for 24 million people and improve basic infrastructure - like electricity - to some of the poorest areas of Brazil.

Some feel the plan is related to upcoming municipal elections this year and has been heavily attacked by critics. Regardless, creation of 24 million jobs is much needed in a country where 30 percent of the population lives under the poverty line.

Here is a very encouraging story from Newsweek about social entrepreneurship and the kind of change that is possible when thinking outside of the box. The story highlights the innovative work of José Roberto Fonseca that is revitalizing the agricultural sector in one of the poorest districts in Brazil. Using a combination of solar energy and a process known as hydroponics, José has been able to create sustainable solutions for agricultural problems that inundate this arid region of Brazil.

But where others saw privation, Fonseca saw opportunity. "Poor people in the sertão have been farming beans, manioc and corn the same way they have since Brazil was discovered, and poverty is as bad as ever," he says, waving at the monotonous expanse of balding scrub and cactus. "It's time they tried something different."

A Brazilian anti-poverty program known as Bolsa Familia ("Family Fund") is getting attention from governments around the world, writes the Economist. Modeled on a similar program in Mexico, this conditional cash transfer program has been tested successfully in several other Latin American countries, and the World Bank is now looking to start similar programs in Eastern Europe.

In the Brazilian version of the program, poor families with children receive direct transfers of around 70 reals (about $35) a month, on the condition that their children stay in school and have regular health checkups. According to the World Bank, this relatively simple and modest program is unique in that it can help reduce both current and future poverty and inequality in Brazil.

Lucy Conger's story "The Big-Country Enigma" examines why micro-credit has flourished in smaller countries like Peru and Bolivia while remaining somewhat small in scale in countries such as Brazil.

Does both over and under government regulation stand in the way to microfinance?