Razor-straight rows of genetically identical trees surround the Baixa Verde community in Brazil’s northeast. The identical trees present a sharp difference to the patches of native Atlantic woodland, among the planet’s richest biological habitats on Earth.
Surrounded by close to 247,000 acres of commercial eucalyptus groves, Baixa Verde exemplifies a uncommon community triumph over a multinational in Brazil. This agricultural community owes its existence due to nearly two decades of court disputes over land rights – yet the conflict continues.
Following struggles to retain their land, the households now confront an unparalleled safety emergency marked by violent encounters, fire attacks and threats on their lives, part of a wave of violence stemming from a territorial conflict that has escalated since 2024.
Conflicts over property ownership have historically been an problem in the area. Securing land deeds is often considered to legitimise land grabs from traditional communities, and local people had suspected that a wood-pulp manufacturer was planting eucalyptus trees on public land.
During 2008, one of the founders of the Baixa Verde settlement and another community member examined public records to inspect official papers. They found the page that proved the 3,200 acres in contention were publicly owned. “We always knew that it was state property,” says the community leader.
Armed with this evidence, they organized 91 local families and aligned with the Movement of Landless Workers, a social and political group advocating for agrarian reform. Its first action was to occupy an area of a eucalyptus plantation operated by the company, accusing the company of using public land.
Following two years after the original occupation, the movement secured official acknowledgment that the company did not legally own the property section planted by the company. “This ruling was a victory not just for the local land rights movement but for all the social movements of Brazil,” says a community member who was raised in the settlement and is now one of the leaders of the movement.
Following many years of roadblocks and legal battles, the state of Bahia reached a settlement with the company and the organization in 2016, returning 3,200 acres of company land to the government and giving each family a plot sufficiently sized to grow their own food. Of the 61 families remaining, fifty-three have relocated into their assigned lands.
“Winning a right to the property means that we now have a space to care for our children,” says the community leader.
Despite losing the land, a corporate spokesperson maintains that the firm has always functioned with “openness, community and ecological accountability” and respect for the local population. “The company has never been convicted of illegal land acquisition and reaffirms that its production areas are lawfully governed and operate with the necessary ecological licenses.”
Yet, in the time following the agreement, the households say they have encountered death threats, gunfire, burned homes, stolen produce and ruined farmland.
Per information from the organization, the conflict now focuses on plots of land that remain inhabited by agricultural workers associated with the regional labor organization. When it was about to lose control of the contested land, the company donated 740 adjacent acres to the union – a donation verified by the union’s leadership.
“We face significant harassment occurring in this area. Our shelters have been burned down, as well as our cane plantations.”
During the last four years, six organizers of the organization have been assigned protective monitoring by Brazil’s protection programme for rights activists, communicators and ecology advocates. The government has suggested that some of these leaders relocate, but out of loyalty to the cause and bond to their fought-for property, they have refused.
Because of the life-threatening messages he has obtained, a community pioneer says he has difficulty resting at night. “I am really scared that an incident may occur to my household,” he says.
The movement states that eight households do not feel safe enough to farm their lands, which remain inhabited by farmers reportedly connected to the company.
The company says that during the previous fifteen years, it has designated “more than 20,000 hectares to land redistribution programs, whether through judicial agreements, contributions to the federal land reform agency, donations, or direct sales, to settle persistent disputes in the territory.”
The firm also says “the creation of the settlements – from planning to parceling and lot definition – was managed completely by the regional authorities, without interference from the company”, and “declines to discuss conflicts between social movements”.
One resident is one of the two people who still reside in the old encampment. She says she has been intimidated by weapon-carrying individuals who surrounded her house and fired weapons nearby. Because no one lives nearby, the resident – who resides by herself – believes the gunshots were intended to threaten her out of reclaiming her assigned plot.
During August, the state of Bahia authorised the removal of labor group-associated agricultural workers who remain on settlement properties – but the decision has not been implemented.
Ecological Obstacles and the ‘Emerald Wasteland’
Besides defending against threats and violence, transforming properties previously utilized for single-crop eucalyptus farming into agricultural cultivation is now the primary difficulty for the settlement residents. Eucalyptus production is dominated by large multinationals that, since the 1960s, have been transforming agricultural and woodland areas into single-crop farms, motivated by global demand.
The country is the global leading grower of the tree species, a rapidly developing, water-intensive plant, whose pulp is shipped abroad to make packaging materials and writing materials. The majority of the nation’s eucalyptus pulp is shipped to European nations, where it is utilized for creating stationery items often promoted as a renewable alternative to plastics – notwithstanding ecological harm caused by single-crop farming.
Within Bahia state, the expansion of these farms has earned the local moniker “green desert”, due to the disappearance of native species and the critical lack of resources and territory experienced by families living near eucalyptus plantations.
One community leader was raised in the area and remembers the river before the region was changed by eucalyptus monoculture. “We previously traversed it in a boat. It was full,” he says. “Following corporate establishment, it dried up.” He attributes the water scarcity to the corporation’s appearance in 1991.
The corporation says it “adopts a mosaic management system, in which eucalyptus is cultivated in plateau areas, while valleys, springs and native vegetation are protected. This system guarantees ground conservation, animal habitat preservation and the maintenance of water resources.” The company also says it “conducts continuous monitoring of small watersheds in its operational zone” and “creates tree-planting and woodland renewal initiatives in areas near communities”.
Within the adjacent region of Minas Gerais state, the tree cultivation area of Turmalina has seen its aquifer depth decrease by 4.5 metres over the past 45 years, according to researchers at the state university.
Vegetation under eucalyptus monoculture absorbs 26% of rainfall to replenish aquifer reserves – versus a 50% level of absorption linked to indigenous woodland. Three-quarters of farming families surveyed in the state reported their crops being affected by the shortage.
The growing of the tree species also poses an increased risk of forest fire. Plantations are so flammable that Chile rejected the species as a viable climate solution after a series of large wildfires in its domestic plantations.
Notwithstanding ecological dangers, eucalyptus plantations continue to play a significant role in the carbon market, with trees being sold as carbon credits to fossil fuel polluters to counterbalance their pollution. Although facing resistance from activists, in {
