Oil's Bloody Secrets in Ecuador and Bolivia

[Judi Lynn]

Oil's Bloody Secrets in Ecuador and Bolivia
Written by Agneta Enström
Tuesday, 06 November 2007


This article is part 4 in a series by Agneta Enström

~snip~
In The Company of The Oil Mafia

Within the multinational oil industry that operates in the southern hemisphere, violations of human rights and environmental laws are more the rule than the exception. Through their collaborations with the major oil companies in the South, Skanska deserves a closer look on this issue. Especially since some of the company’s joint venture partners are notorious giants such as Exxon-Mobil, ChevronTexaco, Total Fina Elf and BP-Amoco, along with several other companies in the global oil industry, and whose operations systematically violate human rights, create political uncertainty and ecological disasters where they operate.

Skanska’s joint venture partner, Repsol-YPF, a Spanish-Argentinean oil company, belongs to this group. According to Oilwatch, their operations are some of the most criticized in the world from a human rights and environmental standpoint <1>. Despite that, Skanska works with Repsol-YPF in some of Latin America’s most vulnerable regions (including the Amazon rainforest in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia), which are characterized by vulnerable ecosystems and where oil extraction is criticized and continually met with strong local opposition <2>. Repsol-YPF is involved in a number of legal cases involving crimes against both national and international environmental laws, as well as human rights and the rights of native populations.<3>

In Argentina alone (where the company has the largest gas and oil fields in the Mapuche people’s territories), the company is the subject of at least four different legal cases involving serious pollution and socio-cultural devastation. However, even in Bolivia and Ecuador, in oil fields where they have developed technical cooperation with Skanska, Repsol-YPF is the subject of legal cases and criticism from native peoples, human rights and environmental organizations.<4>

Calculated Double Standard

In Skanska’s own Code of Conduct, it states that the company actively distances itself from socially and ecologically destructive operations and on their website one can read how they value “social responsibility” and strive for “sustainable development.”<5> However, entering into a partnership with the above-mentioned oil company, when it comes right down to it, is choosing a complete different side and taking a position for an operation that literally walks over bodies for economic gain. The schizophrenic concept that is Skanska’s recipe for success makes for bizarre
reading when comparing its actual practices to the ethics that the company communicates in Sweden:

“We continually strive to reduce our physical environmental impact. We do this in
many ways. We develop tools that facilitate a project’s daily environmental efforts,
intensify efforts to minimize energy consumption in buildings and work for the safer
management of chemical products and the elimination of environmentally destructive
substances.”<6>

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/989/1/

Ecuador: Swedish Construction Versus Indigenous Survival in the Amazon
Written by Agneta Enström
Tuesday, 09 October 2007
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/929/49/

Destruction and Corruption: The Jungle Adventures of an Oil Company in Ecuador
Written by Agneta Enstrom
Wednesday, 24 October 2007
This article is part 2 in a series by Agneta Enstrom
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/973/49/

“Civilizing” the Ecuadorian Amazon: Colonial Corporatism
Written by Agneta Enström
Tuesday, 30 October 2007
This article is part 3 in a series by Agneta Enström
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/972/49/