The Belo Monte Dam - Part 1

As I discussed in my previous post, Amazon Watch discusses a number of current campaigns it is backing to help the indigenous people of the Amazon Rainforest. Until this point, my blog entries have been mainly focused on smaller scale companies amounting to a larger problem, such as deforestation, but as outlined by Amazon Watch's campaign to stop the Belo Monte Dam, indigenous people also face pressure to survive from the governments of the countries they inhabit.

The Belo Monte Dam is seen as a green answer to stop Brazil's reliance on fossil fuels, and to reduce the periodic blackouts it has been suffering from for many years. In order to create the world's 3rd largest dam, up to 80% of the Xingu River's course will be changed - with some areas permanently in drought -  having major effects on areas inhabited by indigenous tribes such as the Juruna and Arara indigenous peoples. To divert the Xingu, two 75km long and 500m wide canals will be excavated, causing major problems for the ecosystems of the river. To store enough water to produce 11,000 megawatts of electricity, two reservoirs will be created totalling 668 km² - in which there is 400km² of natural rainforest.

Proposed site of the Belo Monte Dam

Taken from coastalcare.org

There are clearly many issues to be considered when taking this dam into consideration, but one of the most obvious and earliest effects of the dam’s construction is displacement and the future of those living in the area. In a 2011 article for Environmental Law and Policy, da Fonseca and Bourgoignie highlight the problems faced; noting that around 20,000 indigenous people will be forced to move on. While the dam itself might bring prosperity to a few people in the area with 40,000 jobs created, this is nowhere near enough to satisfy the 100,000 migrants expected to flood the area (this is not counting the 20,000 already displaced), and with them brings an increase in crime, prostitution and housing problems (da Fonseca and Bourgoignie, 2011) and even greater problems for the environment, with increased deforestation as a result of the remaining labour pool of migrants falling back on agriculture and illegal logging techniques, encroaching once again on the indigenous people’s land.

This is only scratching the surface, however, but for now I don’t want to bombard you with endless facts and figures. For that reason, this will not be the last you hear about the Belo Monte Dam as I will delve more in depth into the environmental issues resulting from the possible construction of the dam.   

da Fonseca, P.G. and A. Bourgoignie. (2011), The Belo Monte Dam Case, Environmental Law and Policy, 41/2: 104-107