Death of Jakelin Caal in US custody highlights how land conflicts and displacement fuel flight from indigenous villages.
The family
survives from subsistence agriculture, farming corn and other staples in a
small patch of land. They make about $90 every six months from selling the part
of the corn harvest left over after feeding the family.
"We
could not plant any more since there was not any more land," Caal's
mother, Claudia Maquin, told Al Jazeera the week of her daughter's burial in
December.
Q'eqchi'
communities throughout eastern and northern Guatemala face a similar
predicament. Families do not have enough land to survive from subsistence and
market agriculture. The land in Q'eqchi' territory is largely in the hands of
ranchers, large landowners and mining and palm companies.
Land inequality and conflicts, low
wages on plantations, food insecurity and displacement have fueled
migration from Guatemalan farming communities including indigenous villages
like Jakelin Caal's.
Q'eqchi'
families in San Antonio Secortez cannot make ends meet, Martin Tut, a local
Community Development Council representative, told Al Jazeera.
"Everything
is expensive here and we do not receive anything for our corn," said Tut,
explaining that farmers in San Antonio Secortez make less than $10 per
100-pound (45kg) sack of corn.
"We are
forced to work in palm," he said, standing under a traditional
palm-thatched roof for shelter from the incessant rain.
Conflicts
Plantations
of oil palm, also known as African palm, are taking over large swaths of
southwestern and northeastern Guatemala, including the Alta Verapaz, Izabal,
and Peten departments home to Q'eqchi' communities.
The oil extracted from the palm
fruits is used for biofuel and in all kinds of household products, from ice
cream and instant noodles to lipstick and detergents.
Land, labour
and environmental conflicts around oil palm plantations worldwide have sparked
consumer campaigns to push companies to remove palm oil from their products'
ingredients.
Indonesia and Malaysia dominate the
global palm oil industry, together producing more than 80 percent of the
world's total, but production in Latin America has more than doubled
since 2000.
Colombia is
the fourth-largest palm oil producing country in the world, and despite their
small size, Honduras and Guatemala are still among the top five top producers
in the western hemisphere.
The palm
industry in Guatemala represents 1.2 percent of the country's gross domestic
product and is largely comprised of Guatemalan companies supplying US and
multinational corporations.
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Expansion of oil palm plantations
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The expansion of oil palm
plantations has been accompanied by a host of problems around Guatemala, and
the municipality of Raxruha is no exception.
The rapid
expansion there has intensified and sparked land conflicts, water shortages and
labour disputes, according to a 2015 study about land tenure and palm in
Raxruha commissioned by Congcoop, a network of non-governmental organisations.
Home to more
than 30,000 people, the majority of whom are indigenous, Raxruha is one of the
country's newest municipalities. Before breaking off from neighbouring Chisec
in 2008, large estates used primarily for cattle ranching dominated the
area.
Jakelin Caal's grandfather, Domingo
Caal, grew up in the area and struggled to gain access to land for subsistence
farming. Residents later won the right to land owned by former dictator
General Romeo Lucas Garcia, and 16 communities were established.
Lucas Garcia
and his successor General Efrain Rios Montt both took power by military coup
during the height of the 36-year armed conflict between leftist guerrilla
forces and the US-backed army, which launched a counterinsurgency campaign.
The conflict
left 200,000 dead, most of them Mayan civilians killed by the army.
A UN-backed truth commission resulting from the 1996 Peace Accords concluded that military forces carried out acts of genocide.
A UN-backed truth commission resulting from the 1996 Peace Accords concluded that military forces carried out acts of genocide.
And just
last year, a Guatemalan court ruled that the state was responsible for
genocide, though Rios Montt died before the verdict and his co-defendant was
acquitted.
Q'eqchi'
communities were hard hit. The
first major masters of indigenous civilians occurred in 1978, when
military forces opened fire on Q'eqchi' farmers marching for land rights.
Root causes
persist
More than 40
years later, the unequal land distribution, displacement and structural racism that
were among the root causes of the armed conflict still remain. Long-standing
land conflicts and the expansion of export crop plantations have continued
unabated under the administration of President Jimmy Morales, which has done
little to address indigenous concerns.
Q'eqchi'
families are now increasingly joining the US-bound exodus of Guatemalans. The overwhelming majority of them
have fled quietly, not with the highly visible caravan groups of predominantly
Honduran migrants and refugees over the past three months.
Last year, more than 70,000
Guatemalans were apprehended either at the US border or in Mexico,
according to data from the US Custom and Border Protection and the Mexican
National Institute of Immigration. Jakelin Caal and her father Nery Caal
were among them.
The father and daughter were
detained by US border patrol agents in early December along with dozens of
other migrants and refugees. Jakelin suddenly became extremely ill
during transport in custody and subsequently died. Autopsy results have not yet been released.
People go to work on the palm
plantations and then begin to consider going to the United States.
Prior to heading to the US, Nery
Caal and his brother Carlos Caal, Jakelin's uncle, had worked on a palm
plantation in the area. Aside from subsistence farming, it is the only source
of work for San Antonio Secortez residents.
"The work was more intense
every day and we were paid very little," Carlos told Al Jazeera outside
his father's house, where people had gathered to mourn the death of Jakelin.
They were paid 65 quetzales ($8.50)
for a 12-hour workday, less than the minimum wage, but they also had to pay for
lunch, leaving them with even less income, said Carlos.
"There were nine of us who
tried to demand better pay, but the company didn't want to listen," he
said.
"Nery was the one who took the
initiative to ask for a pay increase. They accused him of inciting [unrest],
and fired him. Those who raise their voices are fired," he said.
Nery was fired after working on the
plantation for six months. He is far from the only one in the area to see
migration as his family's only chance to escape extreme poverty following
underpaid work in the plantations.
"People go to work on the palm
plantations and then begin to consider going to the United States," Pedro
Ico, the Raxruha municipal government spokesperson, told Al Jazeera.
The expansion of export crop
plantations has also spurred US-bound migration of small-scale farmers from
southern Guatemala, from lowland Pacific coastal areas home to large-scale
plantations of oil palm, sugar cane, bananas and plantains.
Devastating farming communities
The rapid expansion of palm and
sugar cane has devastated local farming communities, according to Abelino
Mejia, a community leader from Champerico, a municipality in the Retalhuleu
department.
Part of a multi-community council
confronting the agribusiness sector, Mejia is also a member of the National
Network for the Defense of Food Sovereignty in Guatemala.
"Before there was palm and
before there was sugar cane, which are the principal crops in the Champerico
area, we farmed watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumber, tomato, chile, papaya and
other crops that helped our families subsist and also generated work,"
Mejia told Al Jazeera.
Most subsistence and small-scale
farmers in the area do not own the land, instead the lease plots of state and
private lands to farm, he said.
That began to change in 2005, when
palm and sugar cane companies moved in to take over land rights for
plantations, raising lease rates and draining water sources used by those small farmers who
still had access to land.
"People have been displaced.
Most of them have had to migrate," said Mejia.
"They migrate to other
countries like Mexico and the United States because here in
Guatemala there are really no opportunities," he said.
Guatemala there are really no opportunities," he said.
By Jeff Abbott & Sandra Cuffe
Reference:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/palm-oil-industry-expansion-spurs-guatemala-indigenous-migration-190122160154738.html
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