Floresta, includes a combination of direct monthly payments to families, grants to community
associations, investments in social programmes, and the promotion of sustainable incomegenerating activities, as well as support programmes and administration.291 In order to receive
Bolsa Floresta, beneficiaries must agree not to expand existing crop and meadowland, must
ensure that their children attend school, and must maintain fire breaks.292 Finally, investment
into community development projects is informed by a participatory process that occurs
through workshops comprised of community members.
The JSDR is experiencing an early success. As of 2012, 95 percent of the forests in the Juma
area have been preserved, while nearly 2,000 residents have also benefited from the Bolsa
Floresta, bringing the income of most Juma residents at or above Brazil’s average minimum
wage. 350 houses also have access to drinkable water, and more than 710 residents have
access to light through individual or community power generators.293
Right to Water
The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) allows countries with emission-limitation or
emission-reduction commitments under the Kyoto Protocol to implement emission
reduction projects in developing countries, generating carbon credits that can be used to
offset their own emissions. Hydroelectric dam projects comprise the largest proportion of
technology programmes under the CDM. Despite the fact that the construction of
hydroelectric dams has long raised human rights concerns, including with respect to the right
to water, and has important adverse environmental consequences, there are currently few
human rights safeguards for hydroelectric dam projects under the CDM.294 As a result, some
of these projects have led to decreased water quality295, accumulation of mercury in human
tissues296, or the diversion of water resources from entire communities.297
The CDM has yet to adopt adequate safeguards ensuring the active, free and meaningful
participation of all relevant stakeholders and requiring adequate human rights impact
assessments to consider potential projects’ impacts on the right to water, and yet safeguards
are key to ensuring the rights of affected communities.
CASE STUDY: Barro Blanco CDM hydroelectric dam project in Panama
Barro Blanco is a heavily contested hydroelectric dam project approved by the CDM to be
built on the Tabasara river in the province of Chiriqui, Panama. Serious concerns have been
raised with regard to the additionality of the project, the lack of adequate public consultation
prior to its approval, and human rights abuses involving GENISA, the project developer.298
If completed, the water reservoir of the Barro Blanco is expected to flood communal lands
belonging to the Comarca of the Ngöbe-Buglé, the largest indigenous group in Panama.
More than half a dozen townships along the riverbanks will be flooded, displacing thousands
of people, and irrevocably impacting the livelihoods of some 5000 Ngöbe farmers that rely
on the river for potable water, agriculture and fishing.299
In response to the Barro Banco project and other government plans for mining projects on
Indigenous territory, the Ngöbe-Buglé led a wave of protests that culminated in violent
clashes with the police, leaving three dead and over a hundred wounded and arrested in early
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