Our everyday water, every day is less ours
Background/history to the statement:
The Madeira River is the Amazon’s largest and most important tributary. Spanning about a quarter of the Brazilian Amazon, the Madeira Basin is a treasure trove of biodiversity, providing home to the spotted jaguar, giant otter, pink dolphin, and countless other endangered mammal species. The river teems with life – an estimated 750 fish species migrate some 4,500 km each year to spawn and feed in the nutrient-rich, muddy waters of the upper Madeira.
But all this is under threat. The Brazilian government has built two massive hydroelectric dams on the Madeira (it is estimated that across the Amazon basin there are over 430 dams already in place and another 460+ proposed dams are in various planning stages) Construction of these projects – plus two additional planned dams upstream-would transform the Madeira into an industrial shipping canal, providing the power and transport needed to move large quantities of resources out of the Amazon–and accelerate its destruction. The project is the largest of the Initiative for the Integration of South American Infrastructure, or IIRSA.
The projects have been marked by labor rights violations, and have already blocked the movement of sediment and the passage of fish and threatened the river’s unique biodiversity, affecting the land and livelihoods of thousands of river bank dwellers and indigenous people. The habitat of thirty-three endangered mammal species was destroyed. And the Amazon’s most important tributary no longer flows freely.
Our Every Day Water Every Day is Less Ours
This is a call for understanding and action by Laura Vicuña Pereira Manso, a Franciscan Catechist Sister, born on the banks of the Madeira River, in the city of Porto Velho. She works with indigenous peoples in the Indigenous Missionary Council and is of the Kariri people.
If we take care of the earth, it takes care of us.
if we want water for future generations, we need to start today and not leave it for tomorrow, because tomorrow may be too late.
By Laura Vicuña Pereira Manso, (in Portuguese); edited and translated by Derek Indoe
Introduction
The Amazon region, which consists of nine countries, is interconnected by waters, which are the source of life and good living for the indigenous people, who have inhabited this immense region for twelve thousand years ago. ‘The Amazon River is like an artery of the continent and the world; it flows like veins within the flora and fauna of the territory acting as the spring that sources its people, its cultures and spiritual expressions‘¹. It is fundamental for the life of this ecosystem and for the people who live on the banks of its numerous tributaries, which look like veins, and through which life flows.
As the Amazon flows, it benefits from the immense forest and its rich fauna, which has guaranteed food for the original people, traditional communities and city communities that are formed on the banks of its numerous tributaries.
Besides having a rich biodiversity, the Amazon has one of the greatest social diversities; there are more than 390 native people groups, and more than 140 indigenous people groups, traditional communities that are living in isolation and at risk of extinction: in addition, there are riverside dwellers, rubber tappers, quilombolas [rural Afro-Brazilian communities historically established by people escaping slavery] and others, as well as city communities that are growing, due to the advance of an economy of destruction. This advance puts pressure on the territories, causing displacement of its peoples, in search of better living conditions.
The veins of water in the Amazon help maintain a climate balance throughout the planet. Underground and aboveground rivers, interconnected with their flora and fauna, connect biodiverse systems such as the Cerrado, the Atlantic Forest, the Caatinga; they also ensure that water is distributed in an inclusive manner, bringing rainfall to the south, southeast and mid-west regions of Brazil. But for such a system to work, the forest must be intact to ensure that water is circulated and food will continue to be provided for the peoples who depend on the forest, rivers and land to live.
In a world where so much is interconnected, we need to listen to the Amazonian peoples and see them as interlocutors, because it is they who have an ancient and ancestral wisdom: it is they who have lived together for more than twelve thousand years, to ensure the preservation and balance of the biodiversity present in the region. Regrettably, in the last thirty years, the Amazon has undergone profound changes, with different types of colonialisation, which has exploited the Amazon, left its peoples increasingly in conditions of poverty, and silenced their voice.
The Madeira River: a colonialized and threatened river
Let us now focus on one of the main tributaries of the Amazon River, the Madeira River. It has a length of 3,315 kilometers between its source and its mouth in the Amazon River. The Madeira River has undergone considerable exploitation, and in September 2024 reached its lowest level in history when it registered a level of 48 centimetres, making navigation, fishing, and life unfeasible for countless riverside and indigenous communities. These peoples, who normally get their food from fishing and subsistence agriculture, had to live off campaigns promoted by the Catholic Church, the Secretariat of Social Assistance and civil society, who joined forces to bring drinking water and food to the communities. These communities became isolated. The historic drought and increased human activity led to an increase in deforestation and fire setting in the region around Porto Velho, capital of the state of Rondônia. How did this happen? The colonialization of water and the Madeira River has been going on for a long time and remains to the present day, along with other economic change taking place in the northern region of the state of Rondônia, south of Amazonas and northwest of the state of Acre.
The Madeira River is one of the main tributaries of the Amazon River and a source of sustenance for the peoples and communities that live on its banks. Until twenty years ago, the Madeira River was fundamental to the identity of the communities of Porto Velho and was the source of their livelihood. They could find fish in abundance to feed the community, and celebrate the spiritual value for the peoples and communities that live on its banks. Sadly, though, the river has always been the target of financial speculation and the acquisition of its mineral resources.
Throughout the 1980s, mineral exploitation intensified, using rafts, to dredge gold from the bottom of the River. Attempts to regulate this (recently, in a decree in 2021 which required permission be given only under license before any equipment or operations begin) but this was later declared illegal. Illegal mining on the Madeira River continues, compromising the protection and preservation of the environment. This mining is prejudicial to the health of the population whose lives depend on the river, not to mention the historical, cultural and environmental heritage of Porto Velho.
The indiscriminate use of heavy metals, mercury and fossil fuels has been contaminating the water of the river and its aquatic fauna. As Forsberg (1992) put it: ‘gold mines in the Legal Amazon have annually released more than 100 tons of mercury into the environment‘. Mercury released into the Madeira River enters the water system and is changed into methylmercury, which is absorbed and assimilated by living organisms such as algae and fish, and thus enters the food chain of human beings. More than 10 species of fish are part of the daily diet of the communities that live on the banks of the Madeira River and its tributaries.
In addition to mineral exploitation, the Madeira River continues to be colonialized by business interests, where the economy is placed first, to the detriment of the lives of countless communities and peoples reliant on the Madeira River and its tributaries. The ongoing construction of the Madeira Hydroelectric Complex directly affects five indigenous territories, numerous riverside communities and the urban population of the municipality of Porto Velho. This project, designed to generate energy for the state of Rondônia, is also turning the largest waterway in the Amazon region to a mode of transport of grain to other countries.
These changes have dire consequences. Today the state of Rondônia has the highest electricity bill in the country, and a river contaminated by the indiscriminate use of mercury. Damming the river has resulted in displacement of many communities, and has changed the climate – there have been extreme weather conditions characterized by floods and droughts never seen before. There is an old saying from the “elders;” “… the Madeira River shelters a huge snake, which if awakened, will end the city of Porto Velho.” This time has already arrived with the hydroelectric and waterway complex of Madeira.
In 2023 and 2024, this region had the worst drought in history. This is not an isolated climate event; it is part of a process of advancing the economy of destruction, which turns the water, land and forest of the Amazon into commodities and which enslaves Amazonian and native peoples. The Madeira River, which had been 13 meters deep even in its driest times, only reached the depth of 48 centimeters in 2024, and was as low as 25 centimeters at certain times, something never seen before in its history. This compromised the water tables of the region which dropped to a level never seen before, compromising the lives of the entire riverside, urban and indigenous community populations. These communities only survived through the solidarity and support given by the Catholic Church, the Secretariat of Social Assistance and civil society.
Since the start of the construction of the Madeira Waterway Complex, the Karipuna, Cassupá, Karitiana, Kaxarari and Oro Wari indigenous peoples have had their territories directly impacted. New economic drivers, such as cattle ranching and soya beans, have added pressures and the indigenous peoples and riverside communities, have been forced to leave their lands in the search for better living conditions.
The water we have every day is less and less our water
Water is a source of life for indigenous peoples, and riverside dwellers, who live on the banks of the Madeira River, but with the advance of the economy of destruction the common good of all, a fundamental right of every living being, is being seriously compromised. For the first time in history, we run the real risk of this natural source drying up and so killing the lives of all those who need it.
It even seems ironic to say that ‘the water we have every day is less and less our water’. The Amazon region, rich in water veins, whether underground, surface or flowing over the land, is experiencing an immanent socio-environmental collapse, unprecedented in the twelve thousand years of existence of this rich region of the planet. This fundamental and universal good is succumbing to a rationality based on economics and profit that harms the lives of all the living beings, whether animal, vegetable, human or microorganism, which are interdependent, and form the chain of life for the region.
We would never have thought that we would be experiencing climate extremes, brought about by human intervention, that could compromise the life of the seventeenth largest river in the world. The Madeira River in 2014 had its largest flood, displacing more than 30 thousand families from 17 neighborhoods in the capital Porto Velho, 3 districts and all the riverside communities as well as the indigenous community of the Karipuna people. The Madeira River reached a level of 19.74 metres: the highest ever seen in centuries. Ten years later, in 2024, in the worst recorded drought, the river was only 25 centimeters deep, and entire riverside and peasant communities, were unable to produce their own food, generate any income, or have any drinking water.
The water crisis experienced in the Amazon basin for two years in a row is a consequence of the high rate of deforestation and fires, which since 2000 have been increasing significantly. In the year 2024, the air quality also reached an alarming level. ‘According to data from the IQAir platform, air quality in the city of Porto Velho was considered dangerous, about 77 times above the limit recommended by the WHO (World Health Organization)‘ ³. Instead of flowing rivers, which carried rain to the southeast and south regions of Brazil, we had a river we had a cloud of smoke, which covered this entire region.
The universal right to water has been transformed into a commodity, traded on the stock exchanges at the price of the dollar, leaving thousands and thousands of people on the sidelines, who do not enjoy public goods such as drinking water and basic sanitation. Porto Velho is a city where the population has less access to drinking water and basic sanitation than in many others.
The privatization of the Madeira River, with the Madeira waterway complex, makes the reality of ‘ The water we have every day is less and less our water’ increasingly visible and felt by the communities, who depend on it to live and feed themselves. In addition contamination of the waters by illegal mining affects water, land, and aquatic fauna, the main sources of protein for the surrounding communities.
The peoples of the resistance cry out for socio-environmental justice:
The so called ‘peoples of the resistance’, according to the final document of the Synod of the Amazon, “are peoples of ancient perfumes(sic) that continue to perfume the continent against all hopelessness“5. These peoples resist in an organized way those who promote the death of Mother Earth. Although without many means and resources, they are the ones who denounce the advance of the economy of destruction, which makes the land, waters and forests into commodities. The peoples of the resistance see the land, waters and forests as ‘inalienable goods and the fundamental right of every living being’, because of the bond that indigenous peoples and traditional communities have with the land, water, air and forests.
In the city of Porto Velho, the indigenous peoples and traditional communities joined forces to end the construction of the Madeira Complex, but their actions were not enough to stop it. According to the Movement of People Affected by Dams and the Indigenous Movement, the construction of this hydroelectric plant will be catastrophic for the peoples who live on the banks of the Madeira River and who derive their livelihood from it. After 13 years, a bill was passed to protect the environment, traditional communities and indigenous peoples, as well as the urban population, who live in Porto Velho and neighboring cities.
In thirteen years, we have already experienced extreme weather events, a historic flood and prolonged drought over the last two years in a row, that has reduced the level of the Madeira River to unsustainable levels. We need to listen to the peoples of the resistance who continue to be those who speak against the systems that turn nature into property items and merchandise. They continue to be the voice that is raised against the death of the Rio, of the land and the destruction of the forest.
In listening to the peoples of the resistance, there is a meeting held annually by the Archdiocese of Porto Velho, which actively encourages the participation of the Movement of People Affected by Dams, the Pastoral Land Commission, and Via Campesina, The Landless Movement, the Indigenous Movement, Caritas, the City Housing Movement and the Indigenous Missionary Council. Their main purpose is to enable the articulation of these social actors, defenders of the forest and river, and the joint struggle for ‘land, shelter and work‘, creating support networks and help among the peoples of the resistance in the defence of life, land and rights.
One final word
I end with a request for help. the Amazon is on the verge of socio-environmental collapse and to take care of it, a larger network of support and solidarity is needed. We alone will not be able to stop this dragon of the economy of destruction; we need for our voices to resonate in other places and scenarios of struggle and thus create a global consciousness.
How can we not be alarmed by this critical situation that? What life will future generations have? How can they resist the attacks of those who dig graves in their beds to be buried, by their own hands? How can we not rebel against the scarcity of a universal good and fundamental right of every living being?
This article is a call for action: Mobilizing support in defence of ‘our daily water’ is crucial for the life of future generations and for the life of the planet. With growing awareness that what is a universal treasure and fundamental right is under threat it is important for everyone to mobilize in a fight for the life of the Madeira River and the land and forest beside. Personally, the relationship I have with the Madeira River and the Amazon includes the emotional connection I feel, having lived on the banks of this river, and the identity that I have developed of belonging to this land. Consequently, engagement in the defence of the Amazon has become a life commitment, so that future generations, too, can have a future.
Bibliography :
- Instrumentum Laboris – Synod of the Amazon, n. 08
- https://www.scielo.br/j/aa/a/d8XHcZvKQC9R3fjJpvQYQHF/?format=pdf&lang=pt#:~:text=O%20uso%20indiscriminado%20de%20merc%C3%BArio,MALM%20et%20ai%2C%201990).
- https://www.cnnbrasil.com.br/nacional/porto-velho-fica-coberta-de-fumaca-em-mais-um-dia-de-qualidade-do-ar-ruim/
- Final Document of the Synod of the Amazon: ‘New Paths for the Church and for an Integral Ecology’, n. 44.
- Meeting listening to the peoples of the resistance, articulated by the Archdiocese of Porto Velho.