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In
Focus - Brazil
Originally
inhabited by the Tupi Indians, Brazil's northeastern coast
has been practically inaccessible by land for over four centuries.
This isolation has enabled the rural fishing communities there
to live independently from the large urban centers.
The
fishermen, left to their own devices, have created a unique
culture, preserving an important collection of primitive fishing
vessels and equipment that can be found nowhere else in the
world.
Located
on some of the most spectacular, undisturbed coastline in
the world, these waters of sea, bays, and estuaries have fed
families of fishermen for countless generations.
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Black
Magic
Back in 1998, an Endangered Coast expedition team made
its first exploration into the region. There in tiny
fishing hamlets, they saw descendants of slaves brought
from Africa in the 1500s. The region boasts some of the
purest form of Umbanda (white magic) and
Quimbanda (black magic) in the world. It is not unusual
to find candles on a deserted beach at dusk,
illuminating offerings of food and gifts to one of the
sixty Orixás, or spirit gods. To the north, in
communities of Amerindian and European descent,
villagers with
blond hair and blue eyes are not uncommon; a legacy
of 17th century Dutch and French rule.
African religion in Brazil-learn more
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Tourism
Invasion
Endangered Coast also saw evidence that
the region was shifting away from agriculture and betting
on tourism to bail them out of their beleaguered economy.
Construction of paved coastal roads tore open the region
not only to economic opportunity but to cultural and
environmental degradation. Aided by a strong Brazilian
economy, economists predict tourism will soon surpass
agriculture as the leading industry in the Northeast.
Already its growth rate is 160% faster than the world
average. Believing that employment from tourism can
help lift the region out of poverty, the Inter-American
Development Bank is the leading lender in an 800 million
dollar project to finance tourism and development.
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Why
the Northeast Coast? "The Caribbean is saturated,"
says Cello Sterenburg, tourism secretary for Pernambucco
state, "The next big tourism development is
going to be Brazil's Northeast." learn
more about smarter tourism
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EC
asked Conservation International, a Washington DC based
environmental watchdog group, to asses the damage tourism
development has had on the region's ancient fishing
communities. "I am very concerned," said Paulo
Prado, its Brazilian coordinator, "Twenty years
ago thousands of these artisan fishing settlements dotted
the 4,000 kilometers of coastline, today only a hand
full remain." Some are home to jangadeiros, fishermen
who sail the ancient raft called a jangada.
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Orson
Welles, and
other surprises
The historical legacy of the jangada dates
back to the ancient Greeks and Romans (it was Ulysses
vessel in "The Odyssey"). The Brazilian Indians
called the jangada CUTINGA, meaning white tongue, and
used it for fishing well before the arrival of Portuguese
navigator Cabral.The fishermen who sail these rustic rafts
are called Jangadeiros, and help maintain the last remnants
of small-scale fishing in the Northeast. Their daring
and courage was documented in TIME magazine in 1941.
Orson
Welles and the Raft fishermen - learn more
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Blaming
whom?
It would be easy to criticize the government
for developing this fragile coastline. On the other
hand, the benefits loom large when billions are pumped
into a region in dire need of economic assistance.
Will
the fishermen profit?
A
partial answer lies in a recent sociological study that
echoed conversations EC has had with fishermen over
the years. The events and eventual effects of large-scale
fishing on small fishing villages are similar. When
a nearby coastal highway is built, a once isolated fishing
community becomes a draw for capital fishing industrialists
and a magnet for landowners, tourists, and politicians.
This increases the demand for sea products enormously.
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The study points
out that rural fishermen with their crude vessels and
equipment are unable to meet that demand. So with little
economic alternative they abandon their traditional independent,
fishing vessels and go to work for wealthy boat owners
who squelch their fear of lost autonomy with promises
of upward mobility. In reality, the fishermen poor and
uneducated have little chance to succeed. Once proud and
independent many now feel bitter and exploited. |
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Making
the Case for Coastal Conservation
While the power of photography has helped
the Brazilian rain forest receive the attention it deserves,
places like Brazil's northeastern coast are often ignored.
Lewis W. Hine, a pioneer in social documentary wrote:
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wanted to show the things that had to be corrected;
I wanted to show the things that had to be appreciated."
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In
that spirit, Endangered Coast with its team of photographers
and journalists is determined to bring to the public's
attention the disappearing culture of the Northeast fishermen
and their threatened environment, which contains a variety
of ecosystems.
Its mangrove swamps, beaches, and reefs, according to
a recent U.N. report, are threatened by development, over
fishing, and indiscriminate dumping of major pollutants.
Its Atlantic rain forest, according to WWF is one of the
two most endangered tropical ecosystems in the world,
the other is in Madagascar. Only 2% of its original 1.5
million acres survives today. Some Brazilian sources,
such as Fundação SOS Mata Atlântica,
believe that unless help arrives soon, even that will
disappear along with more than 300 species of wildlife.
learn more
about this region's environmental problems
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One
might wonder, where is the outcry from within Brazil?
Unfortunately, Brazil's environmental movement lags twenty
years behind those in Europe, Japan, and the United States.
Even the few national parks and reserves that do exist,
while improving, are still severely under funded and ineffective.
Armed with the knowledge of a world's shrinking supply
of undeveloped land, its hard not to get involved when
you stop to consider that by the end of the decade, photographs
like those enclosed here will not be possible. |
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