Hidden tribes make an esoteric subject for films. But, this one was for real — one that did not quite make news.
A man belonging to the only uncontacted tribe in South America outside the Amazon basin has been sighted near a region targetted for deforestation by Brazilian cattle-ranchers. When spotted, the man hid behind a tree, and later fled. The next day an abandoned camp, a clay dish, and game ready for cooking were found nearby.
The man, according to Survival International, is one of an unknown number of uncontacted Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians living in the dry forests of northern Paraguay. The Totobiegosode have lost huge swathes of their land in recent years to cattle-ranchers, such as the Brazilian firm Yaguarete Pora SA.
The man was seen just to the south of the area owned by Yaguarete. In a letter to the Paraguayan government about the sighting, already-contacted Totobiegosode leaders said, "We are very concerned about [our relatives still in the forest]. They’re threatened by the deforestation in that region."
Yaguarete was recently fined $16,000/£10,500 by the Paraguayan authorities for concealing the existence of the Totobiegosode in the area where it was given a licence to work. Survival International director, Stephen Corry, said recently, "This is further proof the Indians exist. It’s going to make things even more difficult for cattle-ranchers like Yaguarete in the future."
Of the several different sub-groups of Ayoreo, says Survival, the most isolated are the Totobiegosode "‘people from the place of the wild pigs").Since 1969 many have been forced out of the forest, but some still avoid all contact with outsiders.
Their first sustained contact with white people came in the 1940s and 1950s, when Mennonite farmers established colonies on their land. The Ayoreo resisted this invasion, and there were killings on both sides.
In 1979 and 1986 the American fundamentalist New Tribes Mission helped organise "manhunts" in which large groups of Totobiegosode were forcibly brought out of the forest. Several Ayoreo died in these encounters, and others succumbed later to disease.
As bulldozers and cattle ranchers encroach further into their territory the Ayoreo of Paraguay are worried for the safety of their uncontacted relatives. Other Totobiegosode groups came out of the forest in 1998 and 2004 as continual invasions of their land meant they constantly had to abandon their homes, making life very hard. An unknown number still live a nomadic life in the forest.
The greatest current threat to the Totobiegosode is Brazilian firm Yaguarete Porá. It owns a 78,549 hectare plot in the heart of their territory, very near where uncontacted Ayoreo were recently sighted. Yaguarete plans to bulldoze most of it to create a cattle ranch – this will have a devastating effect on the Indians’ ability to continue living there.
Yaguarete Pora is a member of the UN Global Compact, described as a "strategic policy initiative for businesses that are committed to aligning their operations and strategies with ten universally accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption." The Compact board is appointed and chaired by the UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon.
After satellite photos were published around the world revealing that Yaguarete Pora has destroyed thousands of hectares of the tribe’s forest, the company issued a press release announcing it intends to create a "nature reserve" on its land.
But plans submitted by Yaguarete to Paraguay’s Environment Ministry reveal that the amount of "continuous forest" in the reserve will be just 16,784 hectares out of the 78,549 hectares total, and the company in fact plans to convert around two thirds of the land to cattle ranching.
Earlier this year, Yaguarete won won Survival’s 'Greenwashing Award 2010'. The company won the award for "dressing up the wholesale destruction of a huge area of the Indians’ forest as a noble gesture for conservation."
The Ayoreo-Totobiegosode Indians are a threatened lot. One can do little through the Internet, sitting thousands of miles away from their homes. Yes, little indeed you can do. For instance, by writing a letter to the Paraguayan parliament using Survival’s online letter-writing tool. You can also write to your local Paraguayan embassy or your country's embassay in Paraguay (you can find their address through embassiesabroad.com).
[This write-up has been adapted from materials released by Survival International.]
