On 21 September President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva visited the indigenous community in São Gabriel da Cachoeira (State of Amapá) where he participated in the launch of the Social Agenda for Indigenous Peoples.

The Agenda sets out initiatives that aim at guaranteeing the rights, protecting the land and the social development of the indigenous peoples with an investment of the National Indian Foundation (FUNAI) of around £75 millions for the period 2008/2010. Another £50 millions, from the National Health Foundation (FUNASA), will be invested until 2010 in basic water supply and sewerage services for the indigenous population.

The Social Agenda for Indigenous Peoples comprises three programmes: Protection of the Indigenous Lands, Promoting Indigenous Peoples and Quality of Life for the Indigenous Peoples. The Protection Programme envisages:

• the demarcation of 127 indigenous lands,
• compensation and resettlement of 9,000 families of rural labourers that have occupied those lands,
• recovery of 10,000 hectares of degraded areas,
• creation of citizenship sites, starting from the areas of Alto Rio Negro, Vale do Javari and Raposa Serra do Sol/São Marcos, and
• reinforcing the 11 protection outposts for isolated indigenous peoples.

The main aims of the Promotion of Indigenous Peoples Programme are:

• to record and promote the use of 20 endangered indigenous languages,
• to set up 150 culture points and
• to foster economic projects of income generation and financial self-sufficiency.

In order to ensure quality of life, the aim is to extend the benefits of all federal government social programmes to the urban and village indigenous populations, to use an indicator system and to strengthen the indigenous organizations so that they can exercise social control of the governmental initiatives.

During the launch, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the Ministry for Transport and the Army Command so that maintenance work on the BR-307 motorway section of São Gabriel da Cachoeira and Pupui can be carried out, with an investment of £2.5 millions; and the authorization for a contract for a river waterway terminal in the areas totalling an investment of £1 million. The water supply and sewerage services works are included in the Social Agenda as foreseen in the Accelerated Development Programme (PAC) FUNASA, for the implementation or extension of the water supply and sewerage system in indigenous areas across Brazil.

There are approximately 220 indigenous ethnic groups in Brazil that speak 180 languages. The country is therefore one of the most culturally diverse places on the planet. Out of the 730,000 Brazilians who declared themselves as Indigenous in the last census carried out by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) in 2000, more than a half live in urban centres. Currently, there are 615 indigenous lands that occupy 12.5% of the national territory. 201 of those will benefit from the projects of the Accelerated Development Programme (PAC) of the Federal Government.

Source: Office of the President