Randy Paul leans leftward, and having him run the Latin America briefing has been an interesting experience (on which more here). Today, he's pointing to an issue in one of Latin America's leading economies that deserves more attention, whatever you think of it. It's a good example of a quiet issue whose resolution of lack thereof may have ripple effects in the region.
"Maye I'll Be There To Share The Land"
by Randy Paul of Beautiful Horizons
Concentrated farmland ownership has been a major issue in Brazil for a long time. It's not merely a right-left argument for land reform, but something with a long and tortured history. Now the situation between the landowners and the landless is heating up again. The disparity is striking: some 90% of the arable land is owned by 20% of the population (much of which lies untilled), while the poorest 40% own 1% of the arable land.
Brazil is the only Ibero-American country in South America to gain its independence from its European colonizer without a war (through imperial fiat by Dom Pedro II) and actually had an Emperor during the 19th century. It's my belief that much of the Portuguese colonial structure has remained in some de facto sense, especially in the less developed North, NE and Center-West of the country.
Hence you have landowners with huge plots of land that will remain fallow at best and untilled at worst, while millions have no land to even subsist on. The major landworkers' movement (MST) does not help their cause with land invasions and threats of violence and claims that this is the first step toward socialism. While Lula's efforts have quelled the threat of violence for the moment, finding a solution both sides can live with will be the major test of his leadership on this issue.
Won't tilling the land involve cutting down the rainforests we're supposed to be worried about?
Brazil's not all rainforest. Much of the center of the country is savannah that is known as the Cerrado.
The state of Paraná in particular has large areas away from the remnants of the Atlantic Forest where soybeans are grown as well as pineapple and sugarcane.
It is worth noting, however, that when the military was in power in Brazil, they encouraged people to move to Amazonia (a region consisting of several states and not just the state of Amazonas) promoting it as "Land with no people for people with no land."
I guess having the local equivalent of a Homestead Act would be just too easy.