‘Ribeirinhos’ lose ground to bauxite mines

Ribeirinho woman washes clothes while her children play. She and other residents report that exposure to local waters sometimes causes itching and diarrhea. (Photo by Thaís Borges)

In July of last year, residents of four river communities in Oriximiná, a municipality in the Brazilian Amazon state of Pará, were surprised one day to hear heavy machinery operating in the forest. The ribeirinhos, as Brazil’s traditional riverbank dwellers are known, soon linked the noise to a reduction in the number of forest animals and a change in the color of the water in nearby creeks. “We became frightened to drink the water,” says Jesi Ferreira, a resident of the hamlet of São Francisco. “It used to be transparent, but it went yellow—then even red—after a few days.” The cause, they learned, was Mineração Rio do Norte (MRN), the world’s fourth largest producer of bauxite, a key ingredient in the production of aluminum. The mining company, which has been operating in western Pará since the 1970s, had obtained a license to open a new mine, called Aramã... Read more →