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The expansion of palm oil plantations seems to be the new plague of the decade. Ancient forests are logged down endangering species like the orangutan and the tiger, huge carbon sinks such as peatlans are being drained, rural communities are excluded from the customary lands of which they live. From Indonesia to the Congo, Malaysia and Colombia, the bulldozers advance of monoculture. Behind them, the food industry, the cosmetics business and the new so-called biodiesel. No wonder that unscrupulous companies have started a new land grab race, to take control on a strategic resource for coming decades. The nasty surprise is to find among them also brands of organic products.
The case of the peasant community of Las Pavas is emblematic. "At the end of the nineties, a hundred families returned to their customary land in Las Pavas, where their ancestors had lived for several generations. This land was occupied by a drug dealer, allegedly relative of the drug lord Pablo ...