Women raise their voices against tree plantations

In honor of International Women’s Day on March 8th, a global day
celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women,
the World Rainforest Movement (WRM) and Friends of the Earth
International (FoEI) have released three new case studies and a video
on the impacts of monoculture tree plantations on women in Nigeria,
Papua New Guinea and Brazil.

Watch video here: http://www.wrm.org.uy/

Get full text; support writer, producer of the words:
http://sustainablog.org/2009/03/08/monoculture-tree-plantations-negatively-impact-womens-lives/

These tree plantations provide rubber for car and bus tires, palm oil
for processed foods and pulp for toilet paper – all items being used
in the west. They are also destroying local communities according to

WRM and FoEI. In the case of Nigeria, in 2007, the French tire maker
Michelin came in to the Iguóbazuwa Forest Reserve, a biologically
diverse region supplying food for around 20,000 people.

Michelin bulldozed the forest and local farm lands to convert them into rubber plantations. Women living there lost their subsistence farms and the
local forest which provided medicinal herbs and plants.