{"id":313872,"date":"2026-03-09T12:00:46","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T12:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=313872"},"modified":"2026-03-08T07:43:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T07:43:27","slug":"the-river-won-how-campaigners-in-brazilian-amazon-stopped-privatisation-of-waterway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2026\/03\/the-river-won-how-campaigners-in-brazilian-amazon-stopped-privatisation-of-waterway\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018The River Won\u2019: How Campaigners in Brazilian Amazon Stopped Privatisation of Waterway"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Activists in Santar\u00e9m took on Cargill, one of the US powerhouses of world trade.\u00a0 Photograph: Adriano Machado\/Reuters<\/p><\/div>\n

Local river defenders force U-turn by occupying grain terminal operated by one of US powerhouses of world trade.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

27 Feb 2026\u00a0<\/em>–\u00a0\u201cA<\/span> victory for life.\u201d That was the triumphal message from Indigenous campaigners in the Brazilian Amazon this week after they staved off a threat to the Tapaj\u00f3s River by occupying a grain terminal operated by Cargill, the biggest privately owned company in the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe river won, the forest won, the memory of our ancestors won,\u201d said the campaigners in Santar\u00e9m when it was clear their actions had forced the Brazilian government into a U-turn on plans to privatise one of the world\u2019s most beautiful waterways and expand its role as a soy canal.<\/p>\n

What was arguably most impressive about this historic win was the apparently mismatched nature of the contest: on one side were about 1,000 local river defenders, mostly from the Munduruku, Arapiun and Apiak\u00e1 peoples, and on the other were some of the most powerful forces of global capitalism and climate breakdown.<\/p>\n

It has been barely a month since the US military launched an attack across the border in Venezuela, its first overt strike on an Amazon nation. That was carried out with the clear intention of securing resources<\/a> \u2013 in that case, primarily oil \u2013 and to impose US business dominance in the region.<\/p>\n

Undaunted, the activists in Santar\u00e9m took on one of the US powerhouses of world trade. Cargill generates revenues of more than $160bn (\u00a3119bn) a year, employs 155,000 people and accounts for more than 70% of the soy and maize shipped through Santar\u00e9m.<\/p>\n

\n
\"People<\/picture><\/div>

\nPeople celebrate after the government revoked plans to dredge the Tapaj\u00f3s River and expand rail transport of soy and corn for export markets. <\/em><\/span>Photograph: Diego Herculano\/Reuters<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Last week the Indigenous campaigners intercepted and boarded a grain barge heading into the port. This week they launched a waterborne invasion of the Cargill terminal itself, which they occupied for several days, disrupting business at the US company.<\/p>\n

This interrupted one of the focal points of the global food trade because the Cargill facility in Santar\u00e9m is a primary hub between the nation with the biggest farms \u2013 Brazil \u2013 and the country with the most numerous dining tables \u2013 China, which is the destination for most of the soy.<\/p>\n

The Brazilian national and local governments, supported by foreign finance and multinational traders, want to widen this route from pitchfork to mouth by building railways, roads and a \u201chydrovia\u201d (river-turned-megacanal). The hydrovia, in particular, is seen as a linchpin of national development.<\/p>\n

When I first wrote about this a decade ago, the Santar\u00e9m mayor told me of plans to industrialise<\/a> the Tapaj\u00f3s region and double the population of his city, while the former ambassador to China boasted of the economic gains that would flow to Brazil from opening up \u201cthe biggest food frontier in the world\u201d. Cargill would be one of the beneficiaries.<\/p>\n

The protesters fired an arrow in the spokes of that plan this week by forcing the government to revoke a decree to privatise federal projects on three rivers \u2013 the Tapaj\u00f3s, Madeira and Tocantins. That move, which President Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva announced last August, put dredging and other traffic management operations on those waterways up for auction. This heightened concerns about an acceleration of plans to turn the Tapaj\u00f3s, which already handles about 41m tons of cargo each year, into a bigger and more destructive hydrovia.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Indigenous<\/picture><\/div>

\nIndigenous people take part in a ritual as they occupy Cargill\u2019s Santar\u00e9m port terminal to protest against plans to dredge the Tapaj\u00f3s river.<\/em><\/span> Photograph: Adriano Machado\/Reuters<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The government argued that river shipping was more efficient, less polluting and better for the climate than road traffic. But the Federation of Indigenous Peoples of Par\u00e1 insisted risks for local life should come before profits for outsiders.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe transformation of Amazonian rivers into routes for economic exploitation directly threatens Indigenous territories, traditional ways of life, food security, biodiversity and the environmental balance of the entire region,\u201d the federation said.<\/p>\n

Until 10 years ago, the Tapaj\u00f3s was famed for its crystalline waters. Now it is polluted with arsenic used by illegal miners and diesel spills from the growing number of soy barges. Communities are still recovering from the worst drought in memory during the last El Ni\u00f1o. Many crops died and river levels declined so severely that navigation became impossible and people could not use their boats to buy supplies or seek medical attention.<\/p>\n

When I visited last December, Munduruku leaders at the Jamaraqu village told me the privatisation of the Tapaj\u00f3s would make matters worse because it was being done for agribusiness rather than for the forest and its people.<\/p>\n

The Munduruku and their allies have been at the forefront of campaigns to protect the Tapaj\u00f3s from the encroaching threats of soy, cattle, illegal mining and huge hydroengineering projects. It was one of their most renowned campaigners, Alessandra Korap Munduruku<\/a>, who led the blockade<\/a> of the entrance of Cop30 in Bel\u00e9m for several hours last year, until she was given the chance to raise her concerns about the hydrovia and Tapaj\u00f3s privatisation with the president of the summit.<\/p>\n

The global political, economic and environmental significance of these victories must not be overlooked. Weak environmental governance affects us all. Though still largely unmeasured, it is what scientists call a positive feedback of the climate system: the worse businesses treat forests, rivers and oceans, the more the basis for our economic and physical wellbeing is degraded. The more degraded they become, the greater the lengths companies have to go to influence politics to weaken regulations so they can continue to make money from ever greater destruction.<\/p>\n

\n
\"A<\/picture><\/div>

\nA bulk carrier near Cargill\u2019s Santar\u00e9m port terminal.<\/em><\/span>\u00a0Photograph: Adriano Machado\/Reuters<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By protecting their own rivers, forests and land, Indigenous and other forest defenders are doing all of us a service. The Amazon regulates our planet\u2019s climate by absorbing carbon dioxide, cooling the wider region and ensuring the regularity of monsoons. One new study<\/a> has revealed that rainfall alone generated by rainforest is worth $20bn a year in terms of agricultural irrigation, urban drinking water and sanitation.<\/p>\n

These vitally important global assets are being run down by extractive industries, but most of the damage that farming, mining and construction businesses do to nature, people and economies rarely appears on any national or corporate balance sheets. The only real accountability comes through the actions of local campaigners.<\/p>\n

Amid scientific warnings<\/a> that the loss of the Amazon is \u201cperilously close to the point of no return\u201d, we all owe a debt to Alessandra Korap Munduruku and others who stood up against Brazilian agribusiness, US corporate interests and Chinese and European buyers. With the war far from over, there will be many other opportunities to show support.<\/p>\n

_________________________________________________<\/p>\n

Jonathan Watts is the <\/em>Guardian‘s global environment writer. <\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original – theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

27 Feb 2026\u00a0–\u00a0Local river defenders force U-turn by occupying grain terminal operated by Cargill, the biggest privately owned company in the United States and a powerhouse of world trade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":313873,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[229,2302,536,547,2754,866,3695],"class_list":["post-313872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activism","tag-activism","tag-amazon","tag-amazonia","tag-brazil","tag-direct-action","tag-indigenous-rights","tag-monopoly-capitalism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=313872"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313872\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":313879,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313872\/revisions\/313879"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/313873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=313872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=313872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=313872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}