About Amazon Watch
Founded in 1996, Amazon Watch works to protect the tropical rainforests of the Amazon basin and to advance the
rights of the regions indigenous peoples who face large-scale industrial development such as oil and gas pipelines, powerlines, roads, and other mega-projects. In the U.S. Amazon Watch uses media, investor, and public pressure to reform the environmental and social practices of the extractive industries operating in the Amazon and the financial institutions that fund them. In the Amazon, we work in partnership with indigenous communities, strengthening their capacity to document and publicize abuses and to advocate their own rights.
Currently, Amazon Watch is working with indigenous federations to protect millions of acres of their
rainforest territories. Despite limited media attention, the need for our work is greater than ever. Scientists
warn that the Amazon is reaching its tipping point. At current rates of deforestation, nearly 50 percent of
the Amazon could be lost or severely degraded by the year 2020, and the vast majority of the Amazon will
no longer be in a pristine state.
What We Do
Amazon Watchs strategies are developed in response to the stated needs and priorities of local
communities and according to the following objectives:
Track and publicize new threats;
Challenge extractive industries entry into indigenous lands and forest frontiers;
Reform international financial institutions and the extractive industries;
Win permanent protection for ecologically-significant areas;
Support indigenous peoples in advancing their rights and securing titles to their territories;
Increase the capacity of indigenous and local organizations to defend their rights and their environment and;
Promote green economic alternatives to the current export-oriented fossil fuel-based development
model.
Our Accomplishments
Since 1996, we have successfully challenged dozens of unsustainable and internationally-financed
industrial mega-projects. Milestones include:
Increasing the capacity of our partner organizations in particular in Ecuador, Peru, and Colombia to
assert their collective and territorial rights, and advance an alternative vision for the development and
conservation of their territories;
Contributing to policy reforms with global implications at international financial institutions such as the
Inter-American Development Bank, the U.S. Export-Import Bank, and the Overseas Private Investment
Corporation (OPIC);
Causing setbacks and delays to U.S. oil companies, including Hunt Oil, Occidental Petroleum, and
Burlington Resources; and
Exposing oil industry abuses and contributing to the adoption of improved human rights and
environmental policies as in the cases of Occidental Petroleum (Oxy) and Burlington Resources.
Our Victories
Thwarting ConocoPhillips and Burlington Resources attempts to drill for oil in Kichwa, Achuar, and
Shuar territories in Southern Ecuador and Northern Peru;
Supporting the Achuar in their historic resistance in Peru which led to a landmark agreement to end
dumping of one million barrels of toxic waste and stopped new drilling by ConocoPhillips and
Pluspetrol;
Protecting Perus 500,000-acre Kugapakori-Nahua Indigenous Reserve from future drilling;
Pressuring Occidental Petroleum to withdraw from drilling on sacred Uwa land in Colombia;
Compelling the U.S. government-backed OPIC to cancel its $200 million loan to Enron for the Bolivia-
Cuiaba pipeline;
Stopping U.S. tax dollars (via $213 million in proposed loans from the U.S. Export-Import Bank) from
supporting Hunt Oils Camisea Gas Project in Peru.
Our Current Programs
The Southern Ecuadorian Amazon program is aimed at preventing oil operations in the Southern
Ecuadorian Amazon on the ancestral territories of the Achuar, Shuar and Kichwa and to help protect a
million acres of pristine rainforests. Now in its ninth year of successfully keeping the oil industry off these
communities lands, our program experienced a major turn of events this year when ConocoPhillips
scrapped plans to drill on Achuar, Shuar and Kichwa lands. The program is now focused on getting the
Ecuadorian government to implement a green development strategy and designate this area as off limits
to all future oil activities.
The Yasuni – Green Ecuador Initiative: Amazon Watch is also closely involved in the implementation of
what is arguably the most significant proposal from a developing country aimed at curbing climate change.
The pioneering plan of the Government of Ecuador proposes to leave its largest oil reserve unexploited
nearly one billion barrels found beneath the Yasuni National Park in exchange for a trust fund for
sustainable development. The proposal simultaneously addresses two major sources of carbon emissions
tropical deforestation and oil consumption. Amazon Watch is serving an advisory role to the Ecuadorian
Governments Foreign Affairs Ministry. The proposal contributes to the reduction of global greenhouse
gases, initiates Ecuadors transition toward a post petroleum economy, preserves the Yasuni National Park
and protects the lives and well being of isolated indigenous populations that live there.
The Clean Up Ecuador campaign aims to force Chevron to take responsibility for its toxic mess in
Ecuador, where the company dumped 18.5 billion gallons of toxic wastewater. Cancer rates in this part of
Ecuador have skyrocketed, and local people, including five indigenous groups, continue to depend upon
oil-contaminated water for survival. Complementing the landmark class-action lawsuit against Chevron in
Ecuador, and helping to ensure the integrity of the judicial process, this Amazon Watch campaign has
brought pressure on Chevron from several angles, including through the Securities and Exchange
Commission, which is currently investigating Chevron, shareholder resolutions and media coverage.
The Northern Peru program supports Achuar communities in Northern Peru enduring some of the worst
environmental and cultural impacts caused by oil drilling. For 30 years, Los Angeles-based Occidental
Petroleum (Oxy) dumped up to one million barrels per day of highly toxic discharges directly onto their
lands. The initiative is focused on pressuring Oxy to clean up the toxic contamination while blocking both
Oxy and ConocoPhillips from entering nearly eight million acres of pristine Achuar territory. This year
Amazon Watch joined the lawsuit with the Achuar people against Oxy for the nine billion barrels of toxic
wastewaters it dumped on Achuar land.
The Southern Peru program is focused on blocking the U.S.-taxpayer-funded Camisea gas project from
further expanding and devastating the pristine rainforests and isolated indigenous peoples of the Lower
Urubamba river basin, home to some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on Earth. Pressure from Amazon
Watch and our campaign partners has won a temporary moratorium on drilling inside the Kugapakori-
Nahua Reserve for isolated indigenous peoples. Amazon Watch has also focused political, media and
public attention on Camiseas multiple problems. This case has become a flashpoint in the broader debate
about development and has pushed the Inter-American Development Bank, the largest financier in the
region, to revise its policies. We are currently fighting to block over $1 billion in public financing from the
IDB and the World Bank to Hunt Oil for Camisea II.
The Uwa Defense Project supports the Uwa people of Colombia in protecting their ancestral lands,
rights and culture, once again threatened by oil drilling. While Amazon Watchs work with the Uwa dates
back to 1997, incorporating the UDP with Amazon Watch in early 2006 has allowed us to increase our
efforts to fight against the latest attempts by Ecopetrol, Colombias state-owned oil company, to carry out
exploration in Uwa territory. Specific initiatives in the last year include spearheading a letter to President
Uribe opposing any oil exploration signed by dozens of organizations and providing financial support for
Uwa solidarity-building with sister indigenous communities in Colombia and Venezuela.
Emerging Programs
Climate Change
Responding to increased awareness of the effects of Amazon deforestation and global climate change,
Amazon Watch will work with our partner communities to increasingly monitor and publicize the problem,
making the issue an urgent priority for national governments, international financial institutions and human
society as a whole. Our work will be to advocate for long-term solutions in curtailing deforestation as
preserving and protecting the tropical rainforests is critical to the broader policy solutions now urgently
required to address global climate change.
IIRSA
During 2006, Amazon Watch increasingly monitored the Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South
America scheme (IIRSA), a pan-regional meta-development blueprint that threatens to industrialize large
areas of the Amazon. We have begun to reach out to sister groups and local communities in the region to
expand the alliance of organizations working effectively to oppose IIRSA projects and strategically mobilize
across national boundaries. Funding is currently needed to hire a dedicated campaigner to challenge the
most egregious of IIRSA projects.
Amazon Watch is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, non-profit organization.