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The Amazonian Indigenous communities fighting 'balsa wood fever' and COVID
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Date: None

While the whole world was looking the other way amid the COVID-19 pandemic, extractive companies have increased their exploitation of Indigenous territories in the Amazon.

In Ecuador, for example, the indiscriminate logging of balsa wood has begun, exerting great pressure on the middle and lower basin of the Pastaza river in the territory of the Achuar nationality, as well as that of other nationalities, such as the Kichwa, Shuar and Waorani. The situation highlights the disastrous extent of the impacts of extractivism in the Amazon region.

What’s more, amid a global health emergency, the effects on the local population are even greater. In the Ecuadorian Amazon, the so-called ‘balsa fever’, which has seen the arrival of hundreds of loggers seeking to fell this precious Amazonian wood, became the fatal focus of the coronavirus contagion in Amazonian Indigenous communities that would otherwise have been cut off from the world.

There is much international demand for balsa wood, which is both light and very resistant – and is used to manufacture the blades of wind power generators in Europe and China. Together with my colleagues, Bryan Garces and Lenin Montahuano and the communication team of Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon (CONFENIAE), ‘Lanceros Digitales’, we decided to document the growing impact of the balsa fever through visits to the territory, particularly to that of the Achuar nationality.

We entered the territory through the Chico Copataza road. On the way, we saw at least five trucks of foreign workers carrying wood. At the request of the Achuar leader, we began to keep an audiovisual record of everything that was happening in the territory: trucks loading and unloading wood, boats transporting the wood, people entering and leaving.

Canoeing along the Pastaza River, we saw how dozens of people were stationed on each of the islands that exist along this great river. They were concentrated in camps of about 2km2 on the banks of the river, ready to cut down the largest balsa trees. But this was only the beginning of the balsa fever, the situation would become more complicated later.

"There is no authorization to take balsa wood out of our territory, I have not given that permission, gentlemen," affirmed Tiyua Uyunkar, president of the Achuar Nationality of Ecuador, who accompanied us on our tour, while observing the effervescence of balsa extraction in the grassroots communities.

"Logging must stop immediately because it puts the conservation of our riverbanks at risk and this can then unleash floods that affect our communities. We will hold assemblies with the presidents of the associations and communities because this is community territory and the people must make decisions," said Uyunkar, showing visible concern.

[1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/democraciaabierta/febre-madeira-balsa-pandemia-territorio-achuar-en/