VENEZUELA: Co-operatives Turn Idle Landed Estates Green

'As far as you can see, there was not one litre of milk produced, not even an ear of corn,' says José Tapia Coirán, turning with his arms outstretched, pointing to the horizon of the Venezuelan savannah dotted by trees. 'Now we produce 500 litres of milk per day and we harvested one million kilos of maize.' He is referring to the achievements of the Brisas del Masparro co-operative, set in the plains of Barinas, in southwest Venezuela. Coirán, as he is known by everyone, is a former day labourer and tractor driver for large farms in the area, and is now the co-operative's president. 'Once there was a forest here, but the large estate owners took all the lumber. They left a few trees and thousands of hectares of stubble that we are cleaning up little by little and planting with forage grass and maize,' says Coirán, adding 'they had abandoned this, left it lying fallow, and that is why we took it over.' He and his fellow co-operative members show this reporter vast stretches of plains that are as flat as a billiard table amidst weeds, a marsh here and there, pastures and fields being ploughed for planting, underscoring the co-operative’s explanation that what they had occupied was unproductive land. We come across flocks of herons, scarlet ibis, and some flickers. 'We want to conserve all that we can. We decided not to take down any trees, but rather get rid of weeds and pests as we progress,' says Miguel Méndez, another co-operative member.