Ratanakkiri Indigenous Women Fighting Back Against Illegal Loggers
Posted: Sat Mar 09, 2019 3:19 pm
Women taking the lead in Cambodia
Chris Hufstader
March 8, 2019
Women all over the world are working hard to carve out a place as leaders alongside men. Oxfam and our partners in Cambodia are helping men and women in environmentally sensitive rural areas to share leadership and decision-making power, and find the best ways to protect the forest, rivers, and other natural resources on which they rely.
The bad news mobilized the small riverside community of Padol: Strangers were cutting trees illegally in the protected forest on the other side of the Sesan River, and the village had to stop them. The indigenous Jarai village elders and the community discussed what to do: Of the proposals, ideas, and comments they heard, those of the women were most reasonable. So the elders put a small group of them in charge of representing the community.
Soon, a determined group of women were crossing the fast-flowing Sesan in boats. “I was not scared,” says Romas Phlul, 48. “I just really wanted to stop them. Even if we did not have a boat, I would have swum across the river to stop them.”
When they arrived, the women asked the three workers if they had any documents showing they had the right to cut the trees, and when they did not, the women seized all their chainsaws and motorbikes and invited them to their village to discuss the matter. The next day, a representative from the “7 January” company that had hired the loggers came and tried to negotiate access to the forest, and resolve the dispute, but he got nowhere with the women of Padol.
“Every time you cut a tree, I will come there to stop you,” one woman told him.
Women and the forest
The indigenous communities of northern Cambodia’s Ratanakiri province are under pressure: More than 10 indigenous groups are now trying to consolidate their communal land in forest areas they can call their own in the face of aggressive government and private company moves to gain control of vast economic land concessions for agribusiness and mining. The government has granted some 20 percent of Ratanakiri’s land to these economic land concessions, more than a quarter million acres, according to research conducted by Oxfam’s allies in Cambodia, including the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights. These concessions have been granted frequently without any consultation with local indigenous communities, a violation of their rights under Cambodia’s land laws and international law.
Indigenous women have a lot at stake. “For centuries, indigenous women have relied on natural resources,” says Dam Chanthy, the director of the Highlander Association and an indigenous Toumpoun woman. “They say ‘the forest is our market’ because they get their vegetables, wood—everything-- in the forest.”
She is with a group of men and women from Padol at a sacred place on an island in the middle of the Sesan, a place of worship for the community, amidst tall trees and next to rapids rushing over and around rocks in the river.
Chanthy says places like this in the forest are important cultural spaces for indigenous people; they are where they worship their ancestors. “Every community has a spirit forest, and it is integral to indigenous culture and life.”
The government has granted some 20 percent of Ratanakiri’s land to economic land concessions, more than a quarter million acres, according to research conducted by Oxfam’s allies in Cambodia, including the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights.
Romas Shyob pilots his boat on the Sesan near his village, Padol. He says the participation of women in protecting the forest and guiding the community is essential. “When there is an opportunity to send people to represent the community, we send women,” he says.
Like most places, men tend to be in charge in these indigenous communities in Ratanakiri. But the Highlander Association (HA), working with grants and other support from Oxfam, is helping communities to question the traditional gender roles that society imposes on men and women. Now, men and women are learning to work together in new ways.
Rather than feeling threatened, men in Padol said they appreciated what the women did that day. “If men had gone to stop the loggers, there might have been violence, and we might not have been able to understand why they came to cut down the forest,” says Rochom Ntol, 43. “But women don’t use violence. They can speak peacefully and learn about the root causes of the problem--that’s why it’s good to have women involved in making decisions and helping to protect our forest lands.”
More here: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/st ... -cambodia/
Chris Hufstader
March 8, 2019
Women all over the world are working hard to carve out a place as leaders alongside men. Oxfam and our partners in Cambodia are helping men and women in environmentally sensitive rural areas to share leadership and decision-making power, and find the best ways to protect the forest, rivers, and other natural resources on which they rely.
The bad news mobilized the small riverside community of Padol: Strangers were cutting trees illegally in the protected forest on the other side of the Sesan River, and the village had to stop them. The indigenous Jarai village elders and the community discussed what to do: Of the proposals, ideas, and comments they heard, those of the women were most reasonable. So the elders put a small group of them in charge of representing the community.
Soon, a determined group of women were crossing the fast-flowing Sesan in boats. “I was not scared,” says Romas Phlul, 48. “I just really wanted to stop them. Even if we did not have a boat, I would have swum across the river to stop them.”
When they arrived, the women asked the three workers if they had any documents showing they had the right to cut the trees, and when they did not, the women seized all their chainsaws and motorbikes and invited them to their village to discuss the matter. The next day, a representative from the “7 January” company that had hired the loggers came and tried to negotiate access to the forest, and resolve the dispute, but he got nowhere with the women of Padol.
“Every time you cut a tree, I will come there to stop you,” one woman told him.
Women and the forest
The indigenous communities of northern Cambodia’s Ratanakiri province are under pressure: More than 10 indigenous groups are now trying to consolidate their communal land in forest areas they can call their own in the face of aggressive government and private company moves to gain control of vast economic land concessions for agribusiness and mining. The government has granted some 20 percent of Ratanakiri’s land to these economic land concessions, more than a quarter million acres, according to research conducted by Oxfam’s allies in Cambodia, including the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights. These concessions have been granted frequently without any consultation with local indigenous communities, a violation of their rights under Cambodia’s land laws and international law.
Indigenous women have a lot at stake. “For centuries, indigenous women have relied on natural resources,” says Dam Chanthy, the director of the Highlander Association and an indigenous Toumpoun woman. “They say ‘the forest is our market’ because they get their vegetables, wood—everything-- in the forest.”
She is with a group of men and women from Padol at a sacred place on an island in the middle of the Sesan, a place of worship for the community, amidst tall trees and next to rapids rushing over and around rocks in the river.
Chanthy says places like this in the forest are important cultural spaces for indigenous people; they are where they worship their ancestors. “Every community has a spirit forest, and it is integral to indigenous culture and life.”
The government has granted some 20 percent of Ratanakiri’s land to economic land concessions, more than a quarter million acres, according to research conducted by Oxfam’s allies in Cambodia, including the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights.
Romas Shyob pilots his boat on the Sesan near his village, Padol. He says the participation of women in protecting the forest and guiding the community is essential. “When there is an opportunity to send people to represent the community, we send women,” he says.
Like most places, men tend to be in charge in these indigenous communities in Ratanakiri. But the Highlander Association (HA), working with grants and other support from Oxfam, is helping communities to question the traditional gender roles that society imposes on men and women. Now, men and women are learning to work together in new ways.
Rather than feeling threatened, men in Padol said they appreciated what the women did that day. “If men had gone to stop the loggers, there might have been violence, and we might not have been able to understand why they came to cut down the forest,” says Rochom Ntol, 43. “But women don’t use violence. They can speak peacefully and learn about the root causes of the problem--that’s why it’s good to have women involved in making decisions and helping to protect our forest lands.”
More here: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/st ... -cambodia/