• At the hight of the drought Lake Oroville in northern California lost most of its water. In normal years the bridge of the Oroville-Quincy Highway that crosses a side canyon of the reservoir is just a few meters above the waterline. In 2015 though the canyon was nearly dry and the bride stood more than 60 meters above the ground. Lake Oroville is the second largest reservoir of California and the most important one of the State Water Project, which supplies water for about 25 Million people and about 750.000 acres of farmland. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #moonscapes #irrigation #drought
    At the hight of the drought Lake Oroville in northern California lost most of its water. In normal years the bridge of the Oroville-Quincy Highway that crosses a side canyon of the reservoir is just a few meters above the waterline. In 2015 though the canyon was nearly dry and the bride stood more than 60 meters above the ground. Lake Oroville is the second largest reservoir of California and the most important one of the State Water Project, which supplies water for about 25 Million people and about 750.000 acres of farmland. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #moonscapes #irrigation #drought
  • Gentlemen, you are piling up a heritage of conflict and litigation over water rights, for there is not sufficient water to supply the land. John Wesley Powell remarked in 1883. The great explorer believed that the arid West was not suitable for agricultural development, except for about two percent of the lands that were near water sources. Since then the American West has turned into a hydrological society. Rivers run in concrete beds, across mountains and deserts and up towards money. The Friant-Kern Canal is a Central Valley Project (CVP) aqueduct supplying agricultural fields in the Tulare Basin of Californias Central Valley. The CVP has two purposes: Controlling the regular spring floods, which allowed major cities to grow along Valley rivers. And irrigation, which transformed the semi-arid desert environment of the San Joaquin Valley into productive farmland. On the other hand the CVP has let to disastrous environmental consequences, such as a decline of salmon population in four major California rivers, heavy pollution and habitat loss. Increasingly this system that made deserts bloom and cities boom is out of balance. The region demands more water than nature provides. More than 80 percent of the water goes to an agricultural system that turned harvesting into a mining operation: instead of copper, gold, or oil, it mines highly subsidized water. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #moonscapes
    Gentlemen, you are piling up a heritage of conflict and litigation over water rights, for there is not sufficient water to supply the land. John Wesley Powell remarked in 1883. The great explorer believed that the arid West was not suitable for agricultural development, except for about two percent of the lands that were near water sources. Since then the American West has turned into a hydrological society. Rivers run in concrete beds, across mountains and deserts and up towards money. The Friant-Kern Canal is a Central Valley Project (CVP) aqueduct supplying agricultural fields in the Tulare Basin of Californias Central Valley. The CVP has two purposes: Controlling the regular spring floods, which allowed major cities to grow along Valley rivers. And irrigation, which transformed the semi-arid desert environment of the San Joaquin Valley into productive farmland. On the other hand the CVP has let to disastrous environmental consequences, such as a decline of salmon population in four major California rivers, heavy pollution and habitat loss. Increasingly this system that made deserts bloom and cities boom is out of balance. The region demands more water than nature provides. More than 80 percent of the water goes to an agricultural system that turned harvesting into a mining operation: instead of copper, gold, or oil, it mines highly subsidized water. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #moonscapes
  • Traveling through the Central Valley in the mid of the most severe drought in the last 1200 years felt like a surreal mirage. While the radio was airing stories about water shortages, unemployed farm workers and subsiding lands, the harvest was in full swing. Everything in this desert-turned-factory-farm was green – except for the already harvested fields and the ever-present new almond, pistachio and walnut plantations sprouting from the ground. 82 percent of all almonds in the world are produced in California’s Central Valley. They are highly profitable despite high irrigation cost during the drought, as the harvest is nearly completely mechanized. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety
    Traveling through the Central Valley in the mid of the most severe drought in the last 1200 years felt like a surreal mirage. While the radio was airing stories about water shortages, unemployed farm workers and subsiding lands, the harvest was in full swing. Everything in this desert-turned-factory-farm was green – except for the already harvested fields and the ever-present new almond, pistachio and walnut plantations sprouting from the ground. 82 percent of all almonds in the world are produced in California’s Central Valley. They are highly profitable despite high irrigation cost during the drought, as the harvest is nearly completely mechanized. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety
  • Ward Burroughs puts a fence around on the organic farmer family farm. The Burroughs Family Farm combine Management Intensive Grazing (MIG), where one piece of land is grazed intensively over a short time, with mobile chicken coops. This creates a cycle of organic dairy farming pasture and free-range chickens. This cycle builds up soil and fertilizes the ground. Like most farms in the Central Valley the Burroghs dependent on irrigation. Due to the drought about a third of the Burroughs’ fields can not be irrigated. This forces the otherwise independent farm to buy additional organic feed. With prices of conventional corn skyrocketing due to Ethanol production conventional feed lots compete for organic grains, pushing smaller farmers to the edge. While large enterprises may reflect the increased feed costs, especially organic dairy farms are suffering from California’s multiyear drought. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety
    Ward Burroughs puts a fence around on the organic farmer family farm. The Burroughs Family Farm combine Management Intensive Grazing (MIG), where one piece of land is grazed intensively over a short time, with mobile chicken coops. This creates a cycle of organic dairy farming pasture and free-range chickens. This cycle builds up soil and fertilizes the ground. Like most farms in the Central Valley the Burroghs dependent on irrigation. Due to the drought about a third of the Burroughs’ fields can not be irrigated. This forces the otherwise independent farm to buy additional organic feed. With prices of conventional corn skyrocketing due to Ethanol production conventional feed lots compete for organic grains, pushing smaller farmers to the edge. While large enterprises may reflect the increased feed costs, especially organic dairy farms are suffering from California’s multiyear drought. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety
  • I was walking on cracked dry soil in a small valley in northern California. Hardly any plant was growing on the steep rocky surfaces on both sides. Only about 30 meters above the tree line started, revealing that this was an unusual hike. In normal times I might be diving here. I was down at the Salt Creek which is normally submerged by the Shasta Lake and a popular spot for water skiing and boating. Due to the multiyear drought that raged in California till 2016, the water surface of Shasta Lake was more than 30 meters below its shores edge. Most side arms were completely dried up. The otherwise booming tourism industry had a hard time, state wide restrictions on water use were issued and people I stayed with in Sacramento showered only every few days and flushed the toiled only for solid waste. But as inconvenient as this seems, the real elephant in the room was the state’s agriculture. Irrigating a wide variety of crops from nuts and citrus to wine and row crops agriculture uses about 80 percent of all water available in California. (Ag’s lobby organizations argue it is only 40 percent as some water still reaches the ocean and isn’t used by humans. Some even keep the old mantra going: „A drop of water reaching the sea is a drop of water wasted.“) And it does it with water captured in the mountains in the north and east that is transported by a complex system of canals and pipes, pumped upstream sometimes and over mountains, changing the whole hydrology of the region. For the American West is a hydrological society. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #irrigation
    I was walking on cracked dry soil in a small valley in northern California. Hardly any plant was growing on the steep rocky surfaces on both sides. Only about 30 meters above the tree line started, revealing that this was an unusual hike. In normal times I might be diving here. I was down at the Salt Creek which is normally submerged by the Shasta Lake and a popular spot for water skiing and boating. Due to the multiyear drought that raged in California till 2016, the water surface of Shasta Lake was more than 30 meters below its shores edge. Most side arms were completely dried up. The otherwise booming tourism industry had a hard time, state wide restrictions on water use were issued and people I stayed with in Sacramento showered only every few days and flushed the toiled only for solid waste. But as inconvenient as this seems, the real elephant in the room was the state’s agriculture. Irrigating a wide variety of crops from nuts and citrus to wine and row crops agriculture uses about 80 percent of all water available in California. (Ag’s lobby organizations argue it is only 40 percent as some water still reaches the ocean and isn’t used by humans. Some even keep the old mantra going: „A drop of water reaching the sea is a drop of water wasted.“) And it does it with water captured in the mountains in the north and east that is transported by a complex system of canals and pipes, pumped upstream sometimes and over mountains, changing the whole hydrology of the region. For the American West is a hydrological society. ––– #landrushproject #waterseedland #drywest #bombayfc #USA #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #documentingourworld #hydrologicalsociety #irrigation
  • I had followed the notorious Soy Highway in western Brazil for weeks: I met farmers that had turned a jungle into some of the most productive farmland on the globe, played pool with farm workers that made up a new prospering middle class, lived with peasant farmers that still struggled to find a market for their products but could become wealthy within a year if an extension of the road would turn their land into prime property, danced with the families of the landless workers movement on an occupied farm and with the daughter of a billionaire, interviewed cowboys, truck drivers and a professor that researched the health effects of the constant rain of chemicals that rendered the land from a diverse ecosystem into an industrial park. But when I was sitting with Pekwa on a small boat at the edge of a forest under threat I knew I found the core of this story. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous #soy
    I had followed the notorious Soy Highway in western Brazil for weeks: I met farmers that had turned a jungle into some of the most productive farmland on the globe, played pool with farm workers that made up a new prospering middle class, lived with peasant farmers that still struggled to find a market for their products but could become wealthy within a year if an extension of the road would turn their land into prime property, danced with the families of the landless workers movement on an occupied farm and with the daughter of a billionaire, interviewed cowboys, truck drivers and a professor that researched the health effects of the constant rain of chemicals that rendered the land from a diverse ecosystem into an industrial park. But when I was sitting with Pekwa on a small boat at the edge of a forest under threat I knew I found the core of this story. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous #soy
  • „The white mans land is a land of technology.“ where „A single person is working at night in a huge desert.“ In these short interviews Pekwa reflects on the role of land in the indigenous community and how it is fundamentally different from the land of the white man. Pekwa grew up with the Kayapó, an indigenous Amazon people whose living environment is constantly shrinking. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous
    „The white mans land is a land of technology.“ where „A single person is working at night in a huge desert.“ In these short interviews Pekwa reflects on the role of land in the indigenous community and how it is fundamentally different from the land of the white man. Pekwa grew up with the Kayapó, an indigenous Amazon people whose living environment is constantly shrinking. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous
  • Pekwa grew up with the Kayapó, an indigenous Amazon people whose living environment is constantly shrinking. In this interview series Pekwa describes how the  inexorable wave of „progress“ is eating its way north along the highway, ever deeper into the Amazon wilderness and their territory. All that will be left soon is: „Soya, a sea of soya, till the horizon.“ ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous
    Pekwa grew up with the Kayapó, an indigenous Amazon people whose living environment is constantly shrinking. In this interview series Pekwa describes how the  inexorable wave of „progress“ is eating its way north along the highway, ever deeper into the Amazon wilderness and their territory. All that will be left soon is: „Soya, a sea of soya, till the horizon.“ ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #indiginous
  • The extension of the BR-163 has brought law and order as far as Novo Progresso, a booming town along Brazil’s notorious Soy Highway. One morning, armored cars belonging to the environment agency IBAMA and the military stand in the courtyard of our hotel. The Ministry for the Environment has been trying to set up an office in Novo Progresso for years, but their employees were repeatedly chased away by angry locals. The public officers do not want to talk about their intervention, but they are still waiting for helicopter support. A few kilometers left and right of the road the law of the pistoleros still prevails. They have no intention of letting a few laws hamper their lucrative business with tropical woods and gold. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará
    The extension of the BR-163 has brought law and order as far as Novo Progresso, a booming town along Brazil’s notorious Soy Highway. One morning, armored cars belonging to the environment agency IBAMA and the military stand in the courtyard of our hotel. The Ministry for the Environment has been trying to set up an office in Novo Progresso for years, but their employees were repeatedly chased away by angry locals. The public officers do not want to talk about their intervention, but they are still waiting for helicopter support. A few kilometers left and right of the road the law of the pistoleros still prevails. They have no intention of letting a few laws hamper their lucrative business with tropical woods and gold. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará
  • A group of cowboys and girls leave the Missassi ranch in the early morning to herd and vaccinate some cattle. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
    A group of cowboys and girls leave the Missassi ranch in the early morning to herd and vaccinate some cattle. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
  • Anorival Missassi was part of a group of 23 settlers that originally settled around todays Novo Progresso in the Brazilian state of Pará. In this six part interview he tells the exciting story of his experience and rages about the environmental laws that challenge his very being and legacy. When I visited Missassi in 2012 he owned 2,740 hectares and about 1,000 cattle. He had reduced his herd by a few hundred heads, because the grass that once nourished the cattle in the early days increasingly withered on a depleted soil. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
    Anorival Missassi was part of a group of 23 settlers that originally settled around todays Novo Progresso in the Brazilian state of Pará. In this six part interview he tells the exciting story of his experience and rages about the environmental laws that challenge his very being and legacy. When I visited Missassi in 2012 he owned 2,740 hectares and about 1,000 cattle. He had reduced his herd by a few hundred heads, because the grass that once nourished the cattle in the early days increasingly withered on a depleted soil. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
  • A ranch hand herds Anorival Missassi’s cattle into a corral near the farm house. Missassi was part of a group of 23 settlers that originally settled around todays Novo Progresso in the Brazilian state of Pará. Only Missassi held out, while all others finally gave up or where pushed away by new arrivals and armed outlaws. Missassi built his empire from scratch, cleared the forest with a chainsaw, brought in cattle and breaded for the best quality. When I visited the ranch in 2012 it had 2,740 hectares and about 1,000 cattle. Missassi had reduced his herd by a few hundred heads, because the grass that once nourished the cattle in the early days increasingly withered on a depleted soil. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
    A ranch hand herds Anorival Missassi’s cattle into a corral near the farm house. Missassi was part of a group of 23 settlers that originally settled around todays Novo Progresso in the Brazilian state of Pará. Only Missassi held out, while all others finally gave up or where pushed away by new arrivals and armed outlaws. Missassi built his empire from scratch, cleared the forest with a chainsaw, brought in cattle and breaded for the best quality. When I visited the ranch in 2012 it had 2,740 hectares and about 1,000 cattle. Missassi had reduced his herd by a few hundred heads, because the grass that once nourished the cattle in the early days increasingly withered on a depleted soil. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #Pará #cattle
  • Anorival Missassi looks out from his farmhouse over rolling hills covered with tree stumps, the remnants of a forest cleared long ago. 2,740 hectares, 1,000 cattle—Missassi has built his empire from scratch.  In the early days grass nourished the cattle, but now the soil is depleted: Missassi has already reduced his herd by a few hundred heads. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. The next generation will plant soy here to regenerate the soil. With soy will come huge machines, fertilizers, pesticides, genetic technology and big money. And the rainforest will just be nothing but a distant memory. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #leicam9
    Anorival Missassi looks out from his farmhouse over rolling hills covered with tree stumps, the remnants of a forest cleared long ago. 2,740 hectares, 1,000 cattle—Missassi has built his empire from scratch.  In the early days grass nourished the cattle, but now the soil is depleted: Missassi has already reduced his herd by a few hundred heads. In the tropical forest, the water is retained not by the sandy soils but the plants. They putrefy quickly in the hot and humid climate, providing nutrients to newly growing plants. The rain forest practically feeds itself. Wherever it is cleared, only desert remains. The next generation will plant soy here to regenerate the soil. With soy will come huge machines, fertilizers, pesticides, genetic technology and big money. And the rainforest will just be nothing but a distant memory. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #rainforest #leicam9
  • The cannonade of heavy machines at work drown the song of even the loudest bird of the Amazon. The earth shakes under our feed. Rays of light cut through the darkness. Then one, two, three, four caterpillars slowly creep by. I watch them as they continue down the road, their roar slowly fading away and the lights just points in the evening. Then they turn and return on the path they smooth in the jungle. The road is the starting point, the artery through which human life flows into the region. Back in the seventies, Brazil’s military junta instigated a settlement program in the west to secure the border against immigrants from neighboring countries. They built two roads through the jungle: the Transamazonica from east to west along the Amazon River, and the BR-163, called the Soy Highway, running north from Cerrado. The BR-163 has been known as one of the most dangerous roads in the world. During the dry season the road was somewhat passable but during the wet season it turned into a slippery sludge channel. Hundreds of trucks got swallowed by mud-holes, bridges collapsed under overloaded trucks or were washed away by torrential floods. For decades this was the frontier, the land of rough truckers, loggers, bandits and ranchers. With the agricultural boom in Mato Grosso the situation became unbearable. To reduce transport cost for commodities the BR-163 was finally paved and by 2012 most parts of it were in an acceptable condition. The road opens up the wilderness for unfathomable wealth, work, education, and laws. The price for this dream is mono-culture, pesticides, and the distruction of nature. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #leicam9
    The cannonade of heavy machines at work drown the song of even the loudest bird of the Amazon. The earth shakes under our feed. Rays of light cut through the darkness. Then one, two, three, four caterpillars slowly creep by. I watch them as they continue down the road, their roar slowly fading away and the lights just points in the evening. Then they turn and return on the path they smooth in the jungle. The road is the starting point, the artery through which human life flows into the region. Back in the seventies, Brazil’s military junta instigated a settlement program in the west to secure the border against immigrants from neighboring countries. They built two roads through the jungle: the Transamazonica from east to west along the Amazon River, and the BR-163, called the Soy Highway, running north from Cerrado. The BR-163 has been known as one of the most dangerous roads in the world. During the dry season the road was somewhat passable but during the wet season it turned into a slippery sludge channel. Hundreds of trucks got swallowed by mud-holes, bridges collapsed under overloaded trucks or were washed away by torrential floods. For decades this was the frontier, the land of rough truckers, loggers, bandits and ranchers. With the agricultural boom in Mato Grosso the situation became unbearable. To reduce transport cost for commodities the BR-163 was finally paved and by 2012 most parts of it were in an acceptable condition. The road opens up the wilderness for unfathomable wealth, work, education, and laws. The price for this dream is mono-culture, pesticides, and the distruction of nature. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #leicam9
  • Through the rift of destruction we travel. Always north, ever deeper into the Amazon rain forest. Often the road is described as a scar on this amazing ecosystem. But this picture is wrong. In reality it is a festering wound that never has a chance to heal. It is opened again and again by new arrivals, the constant search for fortune and profit. At its edges it infects the healthy tissue of Pachamama, rots away its beauty and balance, condemning it to a stealthy death and resurrection as a technological zombie land. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation
    Through the rift of destruction we travel. Always north, ever deeper into the Amazon rain forest. Often the road is described as a scar on this amazing ecosystem. But this picture is wrong. In reality it is a festering wound that never has a chance to heal. It is opened again and again by new arrivals, the constant search for fortune and profit. At its edges it infects the healthy tissue of Pachamama, rots away its beauty and balance, condemning it to a stealthy death and resurrection as a technological zombie land. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #slowviolence #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation
  • We met this group of cowboys on their way to a cattle drive at a gas station in Novo Progresso. Novo Progresso, founded some 40 years ago in the middle of the Amazon forest has since become one of the boomtowns along the BR163. The road often referred to as the soy-highway connects Mato Grosso’s capital Cuiaba with the Amazonian harbor Santarem. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydayeverywhere #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #ontheroad #cowboy
    We met this group of cowboys on their way to a cattle drive at a gas station in Novo Progresso. Novo Progresso, founded some 40 years ago in the middle of the Amazon forest has since become one of the boomtowns along the BR163. The road often referred to as the soy-highway connects Mato Grosso’s capital Cuiaba with the Amazonian harbor Santarem. ——— „LandRush – The Road follows the extension of the Soy Highway in Western Brazil, that drives the agricultural boom ever deeper into the Amazon basin. It is part of the larger @landrushproject about global agriculture, water, seeds and land: http://bit.ly/lrinst ——— #WhiteGoldProject #landrushproject #waterseedland #bombayfc #environmentalphotography #environmentalphotojournalism #slowjournalism #brazil #everydaylatinamerica #everydayeverywhere #everydaybrasil #amazon #documentary #deforestation #ontheroad #cowboy