Janette Bulkan

The Struggle for Recognition of the Indigenous Voice: Amerindians in Guyanese Politics

Abstract In Guyana’s racialised geography, Amerindians live in scattered villages in the vast hinterland that covers 90% of the country. Amerindian iconography is appropriated in state-making, even while Amerindians themselves are consigned to a patron–client relationship with the dominant ‘coastlander’ society. In the late 1950s, Amerindians made up only 4% of the national population but voted as a bloc in the national elections of 1957, 1961 and 1964, rallying around Stephen Campbell, the first Amerindian member of the legislature. Their unified position allowed their political leaders to negotiate a commitment to the settlement of Amerindian land claims as a condition of Independence in 1966. After losing its parliamentary majority in 2011, the coastlander-based party in power has been working to disrupt cohesion among Amerindian community leaders. The government uses a variety of funds to reward community leaders who will sign pre-prepared resolutions at the statutory National Toshaos Council meetings, and denies funds to leaders and communities that protest at government neglect and mismanagement of the traditional areas claimed by the indigenous peoples.

Forest Grabbing Through Forest Concession Practices: The Case of Guyana

Colonial governments asserted sovereignty and property rights gradually over the territory of Guyana, disregarding preexisting Indigenous Rights. Although a Forest Department modeled on the Indian Forest Service was established, there was no equivalent settlement process to determine the rights of forest peoples. State Forest area is declared by administrative fiat. These two elements have enabled State-endorsed forestland grabbing. Logging was scattered and selective until the early 1980s. A neoliberal economic program from the 1980s has allowed Asian companies to gain control over at least 80% of large-scale forestry concessions, equivalent to one-third of the 15.8 million hectares (Mha) of State-administered public forests. The relative success of the Asian companies can be understood in terms of available capital, willingness to invest, knowledge of markets, and willingness to corrupt. The relative failure of the preexisting Guyanese-owned businesses can be understood in terms of lack of capital, inability to save and unwillingness to invest, lack of knowledge of marketing, and lack of cooperation within the sector. Some conclusions from the Guyana story are relevant to other countries related to resource-hungry transnational enterprises.

Nutritional status of Makushi Amerindian children and adolescents of Guyana

Background: Amazonian Indians are in the midst of a rapid cultural transition. The developments affecting Amazonian Indians present an opportunity to address important public health problems through public and private initiatives, but to do so it is imperative to begin with information on the health status of these peoples and the underlying factors affecting it. However, relatively few such data are available for this vast region. Aim: This study describes the nutritional status of Makushi Amerindians of Guyana and considers several variables which might help to explain it. Subjects and methods: Data for 792 Makushi, 0–20 years of age from 11 villages are considered. Outcome variables considered are anthropometric markers of growth and nutritional status; specifically height-for-age, weight-for-height and body-mass index. Predictor variables explored are age, sex, relative isolation, number of siblings, season of birth, diet and morbidity. Fishers exact test, chi-square, Pearsons correlation and multiple regression were used to assess possible relationships between these variables. Results: Relative to other Amazonian Indians, the Makushi have a lower rate of linear-growth faltering and a higher rate of linear-growth faltering relative to non-Amerindian Guyanese. Males, older cohorts, those living in isolated villages or born in the wet season showed higher rates of growth faltering. Conclusion: Makushi nutritional status may be explained by sex, age, relative isolation, family size, season of birth, dietary intake and infectious disease.

Legitimacy of public domain forest taxation, and combatting corruption in forestry.

SUMMARY Taxation systems for publicly-owned forests should be founded on a governments constitutional right of radical tenure, simultaneously recognising the rights of forest-dependent stakeholders to share benefits and responsibilities. Complex taxes may be historically explicable but are open to corrupt diversions. A systems approach may be essential for benefit sharing to really reach geographically or institutionally remote beneficiaries. The purpose of each tax should be justified and communicated to tax payers, including through participatory development of tax laws. Transparency in justification and implementation of forest taxes helps to diminish corruption through replacement of administrative discretion by rule-based decision making. Strategists should be more aware of the links between criminality in various sectors.

Indigenous Children’s Knowledge About Non-timber Forest Products in Suriname

Childhood and adolescence are important life stages for the acquisition of knowledge about non-timber forest products (NTFPs). We show at which stage in life traditional plant knowledge is learned and analyze whether cross-cultural ethnobotanical knowledge transmission takes place. We evaluate whether the degree of forest dependency influences ethnobotanical knowledge by comparing two indigenous communities in Suriname. Traditional knowledge was documented and vouchers collected during forest walks with adult informants. Questionnaires were completed by 74 schoolchildren (age 4 to 14) to capture their knowledge of names and uses of nine important NTFPs. We tested for knowledge differences by ethnicity and NTFP categories. Local names for NTFPs were analyzed to determine cross-cultural transmission of ethnobotanical knowledge. Children from the forest-dependent Trio community (n = 23) possessed similar knowledge of NTFPs as their more urbanized peers from Apoera (n = 51). NTFP uses were acquired at an earlier age than plant names. Food and commercial NTFP uses were better known than medicinal plant uses. Cross-cultural transfer of knowledge occurred between the two communities. NTFP knowledge of children appeared to be influenced more by the time they spent within the forest, either walking to school or walking to agricultural plots, than by the level of forest dependency or acculturation.AbstractDe jeugd en pubertijd zijn belangrijke levensfasen voor het verwerven van kennis over Niet-Hout Bosproducten (NTFP’s) bij bewoners van het Amazonegebied. Dit onderzoek had als doel te achterhalen in welke levensjaren traditionele plantenkennis wordt toegeëigend en of er ethnobotanische kennis wordt uitgewisseld tussen twee Inheemse gemeenschappen in Suriname. Verwacht werd dat de afhankelijkheid van het bos de hoeveelheid ethnobotanische kennis beïnvloedt. Tijdens boswandelingen met volwassen informanten is traditionele kennis over NTFPs gedocumenteerd en zijn er botanische specimens verzameld. Door 74 schoolgaande kinderen (4 tot 14 jaar) zijn vragenlijsten ingevuld om hun kennis te achterhalen over lokale namen en toepassingen van negen belangrijke NTFP soorten. Het verschil in kennis werd vergeleken tussen twee ethnische groepen en NTFP-categorieën (eetbaar en medicinaal). Lokale namen voor NTFP’s werden geanalyseerd om overdracht van ethnobotanische kennis tussen de gemeenschappen te bepalen. Tegen de verwachting in hadden kinderen uit de bosafhankelijke Trio-gemeenschap (n = 23) dezelfde kennis over NTFP’s als de meer verstedelijkte kinderen uit Apoera (n = 51). NTFP-toepassingen waren op jongere leeftijd beter bekend dan plantennamen. Eetbare en commerciële bosproducten waren beter bekend dan medicinale planten. Overdracht van kennis vond plaats tussen de twee gemeenschappen. De NTFP-kennis van kinderen bleek meer beïnvloed te worden door de tijd die ze in het bos besteden, dan door het niveau van bosafhankelijkheid of acculturatie.

Sustainability issues of commercial non-timber forest product extraction in West Suriname

BackgroundNon-timber forest products (NTFPs) have been traded for millennia by indigenous communities. Current increased demands driven by globalisation, however, put more pressure on local harvesters and their surrounding ecosystems. The safeguarding of indigenous access rights to harvesting grounds is needed, either through communal land titles or collaborative management agreements, both to secure prior indigenous rights and to minimise further negative ecological impacts.MethodsThis study was carried out in two indigenous communities in West Suriname located along the Corentyne River. We assessed the three economically most important NTFPs for each community. We determined the land tenure status of harvesting grounds and negative impacts on target species and/or ecosystem. Ethnobotanical data were collected (n = 53), and semi-structured interviews were held with hunters and gatherers (n = 13). Local and national maps were acquired, and their data merged.ResultsResults showed that the communities have no tenure security over their most important harvesting sites. These collection sites are State owned and some under (active) logging concession. All of the traded wild animal populations had decreased because of increased local and non-local commercial interest, especially the stingray Potamotrygon boesemani (first described in 2008), which was traded for US

The Limitations of International Auditing: The Case of the Norway-Guyana REDD Agreement

250 per live specimen. The stingray population had become imperilled within months as local and (inter-) national regulations for this species are non-existent.ConclusionsWe stress the urgent need for collaborative management agreements over the harvesting sites between the government of Suriname and the indigenous communities to prevent further non-local developments and harvesting to disturb the local economy. An immediate moratorium on the export of P. boesemani is necessary to prevent the extinction of this endemic stingray.

Weaning practices of the Makushi of Guyana and their relationship to infant and child mortality: A preliminary assessment of international recommendations

This chapter focuses on the practices of international auditing firms sponsored directly or indirectly by the Government of Norway to verify Guyana’s compliance with indicators intended, inter alia, to improve forest governance as part of a global Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) strategy. I argue that by dealing principally with the Executive arm of the Guyana Government, and not including the legislative arm (Parliament), the Norwegian Government defeated its own declared intention to advance governance in REDD. I show that both governments have a vested interest in positive audit reports and appear to have used their power accordingly to reward or dismiss auditors. I argue that the progressive watering down of the compliance indicators makes such weakly monitored REDD schemes ineffective as one mechanism for slowing global warming. I recommend that credible auditing should be carried out by mixed teams of global and local auditors with strong terms of reference, recruited independently of the client governments, and required to report back in culturally appropriate language to key affected constituency groups.