Maravi

(PROGRESS) Reaping Rents Causes Deaths

In Brazil, farmworkers get murdered. In Washington, the government leaves workers at risk. In West Virginia, workers accept dying. To end the danger, workers need a level playing field -- which geonomics delivers. We trim, blend, and append three 2010 articles from: (1) BBC, Apr 2, on Brazil; (2) Associated Press, Apr 2, on Washington state by George Tibbits; and (3) Reuters, Apr 6, by Joe Rauch.

Reaping Rents Causes Deaths
by BBC, by George Tibbits, and by Joe Rauch
Land activist killed in Brazilian Amazon
A Brazilian land reform activist has been killed in the Amazon state of Para amid ongoing land disputes in the area.

Two men on motorbikes shot Pedro Alcantara de Souza, leader of a union of landless farmers in Para, five times in the head as he was riding a bicycle.

He had led the occupations of large farms by peasants and had previously served for 14 years as the city councilor of Rendencao.

American nun Dorothy Stang was killed in the same region in 2005. Mr Souza was shot just hours after the trial was delayed of the landowner accused of ordering the murder of Dorothy Stang, 73.

Vitalmiro Bastos Moura was originally convicted for the killing in 2007. The verdict was overturned a year later, but he is now due to face a third trial.

There were 20 documented killings in 2008 linked to land issues in the Amazon.

Nearly half the arable land in Brazil belongs to just 1% of the population.

Brazil's agrarian reform laws state that unused farmland can be taken by the government and distributed among landless farmers.

JJS: Instead of nationals squatting or confiscating, other nations successfully broke up huge plantations by taxing land. Owners paid the land rent, sold off their excess, former tenants became family farmers, the societies prospered (e.g., Taiwan), and nobody got shot. Brazil might try what works, a version of geonomics.

Labels: BRAZIL, LAND REFORM, LAND RIGHTS

posted by MrK @ 11:14 PM