National Geographic
By: Scott Wallace
May 23, 2016
The Kawahiva are a tribe of hunter-gatherers that have been running from loggers and other intruders for decades. Tribal rights activists are trying to set the boundaries of Kawahiva do Rio Pardo Indigenous Territory. Dilma Rouseff and her justice minister hurriedly signed 11 executive orders for indigenous tribes in her last days in office. Of the 11, the Kawahiva are the only isolated tribe. They have been granted 4,120 square kilometers of dense forest. Loggers are finding new ways to get into the Kawahiva territory. They go in on foot or motorbikes, cut down the trees, then make a path for the trucks to come through. By the time agents arrive, the loggers are already gone. Later, a team had also detected a large area of deforested land where loggers and land speculators were setting up operations six miles away from the Kawahiva encampment. With the help of agents, the operation was shut down, but there is always the risk of them coming back.
That land is rightfully the Kawahivas. It's not like the Kawahivas took every bit of forest and tree. The loggers just seem terrible and I would never even want to talk to one. I think some agents should start putting out serious threat, like going to jail for ten years, and put up cameras to catch the people cutting them down. This is not a positive topic, and I might be able to help by making or signing a petition for serious repercussions. If people blew up the internet with this, then the tribe might get more protection. I want to go to that land and see why the trees, that are a home to the tribe, are so important, even ask the loggers. Why do the loggers need so much trees that they can't cut down their own? I think that the tribe should get more protection and the loggers should get some threats against cutting down another territories trees.
Biology
