\n<\/p>\n
Sergio Rojas recalls how, as a child, he would see bulldozers rolling into Argentina<\/a>\u2019s Gran Chaco region, razing the forests to the ground and setting the felled trees alight. Animals would scatter and flee, with armadillos, deer, snakes and lizards darting across the ground in search of a new home.<\/p>\n The forests of the Gran Chaco were also Rojas\u2019s home. He and his family, members of Argentina\u2019s Indigenous Qom community, lived a nomadic lifestyle in the forest, relying on the woodlands and rivers for shelter and food, relocating about every 20 days to allow the land to regenerate and recover.<\/p>\n The Gran Chaco is an expanse of arid woodland that stretches across the northernmost regions of Argentina and into Brazil, Paraguay and Bolivia. It is also the centre of rampant deforestation, driven predominantly by cattle ranching, logging and agriculture, especially the soya industry.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Chaco is in danger of extinction. We are witnessing an ecocide,\u201d says Rojas. \u201cThis has to stop now because otherwise, there won\u2019t be anything left. Nobody is doing anything \u2013 not the state nor the justice system; only the Indigenous communities. This directly affects our daily reality and our needs to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n A new report published today<\/a> by the international environmental and human rights organisation Global Witness shows that the Spanish bank Santander, the 14th largest in the world<\/a> and a familiar presence on the British high street, has been indirectly funding deforestation activities in the Gran Chaco, an ecosystem sprawling across Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay.<\/p>\n The company Santander has invested in,\u00a0the Argentinian agribusiness group Cresud<\/a>, also operates in the region through the Brazilian company BrasilAgro, of which it owns 34.2% of the shares.<\/p>\n Global Witness says: \u201cThe company [Cresud] has deforested over 170,000 hectares [420,000 acres] in South America since the turn of the century, an area more than three times larger than Madrid.\u201d<\/p>\n Known to local Argentinians as the \u201cImpenetrable Chaco\u201d, the area has an Indigenous population of 5.6 million people spread across the four countries<\/a>. It is also one of South America\u2019s largest ecosystems and one of the region\u2019s last climate-critical forests, home to more than 3,400 plant species and nearly 900 bird, mammal, reptile and amphibian species.<\/p>\n Looking at its policies, Santander does not appear to be a very prudent organisation<\/p>\n Ola Janus, BankTrack<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n The report asserts that Santander<\/a> has \u201cco-arranged\u201d, along with \u201cmultiple Argentinean and international banks\u201d, a total of $1.3bn (\u00a3980m) of financing for Cresud since 2011.<\/p>\n \u201cThe total of $1.3bn was jointly underwritten by Santander with multiple Argentinean and international banks, with Santander frequently taking the role of a lead underwriter,\u201d the report says. \u201cSantander co-led banking groups have helped underwrite over three-quarters of the bonds issued by the company since 2011, and the bank has provided over $50m in loans to Cresud directly.\u201d<\/p>\n Santander\u2019s financing of Cresud took place despite the bank introducing a deforestation limitation policy<\/a> in 2018 and committing to a goal of net-zero emissions in its portfolio by 2050<\/a>. \u201cSince the policy was first published, Santander has been a co-underwriter of $850m of debt for Cresud,\u201d says the report.<\/p>\n According to Global Witness, \u201cSantander is a lead or principal underwriter for 35 of the 47 bonds issued by the company since 2002, and consortia co-lead by the bank accounts for over 90% of the total dollar value of bonds issued by the company.\u201d<\/p>\n Part of the funding backed by Santander would have been used to buy and deforest land across the Chaco region via a \u201creal estate model\u201d, according to Global Witness.<\/p>\n Santander, one of the EU\u2019s five largest banks by assets<\/a>, is also the bloc\u2019s leading lender to \u201cforest-risk\u201d companies. In 2024, it provided more than $600m (\u00a3452m) in financing<\/a> to firms linked to beef, palm oil, soya and other agricultural supply chains that are significant drivers of deforestation.<\/p>\n Related: <\/span>\u2018The forests are going up in flames \u2013 so is the rule of law\u2019: Argentina\u2019s climate of fear<\/a><\/p>\n Charlie Hammans, author of the Global Witness report, says: \u201cThe business model is finding areas to develop, purchasing them cheaply, clearing them and then selling them on. The Chaco is deemed non-productive land to be converted into productive land, as opposed to a vital ecosystem and also home to vast amounts of Indigenous peoples to be defended.\u201d<\/p>\n Global Witness asked Santander if its financing of Cresud breached the bank\u2019s policies. In response, Santander says its \u201cpractice is not to comment on information relating to clients or specific transactions\u201d.<\/p>\n A Santander spokesperson also described the allegations in the report as \u201ccontaining imprecision and potential information regarding our policies that is not accurate\u201d, but did not provide specific evidence to support that statement.<\/p>\n Janus, head of the banks and nature campaign at the financial monitoring campaign organisation BankTrack, says: \u201cLooking at its policies, Santander does not appear to be a very prudent organisation. There\u2019s a lot of space for improvement in making those policies stringent.<\/p>\n \u201cTo truly stop these issues, we need a fundamental transformation in how the financial sector operates because it\u2019s still neocolonial.\u201d<\/p>\n Neither Santander nor Cresud responded to the Guardian\u2019s requests for comment.<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n In recent decades, the Gran Chaco has become an agricultural hub and driver of the regional economy. Cultivation of soya beans has expanded, with a 30% increase of the area under production in Argentina between 2001 and 2022, while Paraguay saw a 15-fold rise from 2012 to 2022, according to the World Economic Forum<\/a>.<\/p>\n Livestock production has also increased, especially in Paraguay, where 67.4% of beef exports<\/a> originate from the Gran Chaco. In Argentina, the region is home to 33% of the country\u2019s cattle<\/a>.<\/p>\n Clearing of forests across the Chaco linked to such agricultural expansion has left the region more vulnerable to the climate crisis<\/a>, worsening the effects of droughts, floods, heatwaves and forest fires<\/a>. Argentina suffered $2.67bn in export losses<\/a> due to drought in 2022.<\/p>\n According to Global Witness data, most of the deforested land \u2013 more than 100,000 hectares (250,000 acres) \u2013 is in Argentina, where deforestation has long scarred the northern provinces of Formosa, Santiago del Estero, Salta and Chaco, where companies such as Cresud operate.<\/p>\n In the past 25 years, Greenpeace Argentina calculates that approximately 8m hectares of native forest land have been lost in the country, with almost 80% of that deforestation occurring in Argentina\u2019s Gran Chaco<\/a>.<\/p>\n The expansion of the logging industry means not only the plundering of resources but also of our languages<\/p>\n Indigenous Wich\u00ed leader<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cIn the last few decades, the Gran Chaco is probably one of the most deforested areas on the planet,\u201d says Hern\u00e1n Giardini, coordinator of Greenpeace Argentina\u2019s forest campaigns.<\/p>\n He notes that, besides the loss of biodiversity, local communities are also affected. \u201cIndigenous people are often the ones who suffer the most from the impact. They may be reduced to a limited space where their way of hunting, gathering and fishing becomes unviable.\u201d<\/p>\n Communities in the Argentinian Chaco have complained repeatedly <\/a>about feeling excluded from the consultation required for agrobusinesses to obtain land.<\/p>\n Related: <\/span>\u2018A cemetery of trees\u2019: vast green expanses turned to dust as loggers plunder South America\u2019s Gran Chaco<\/a><\/p>\n\n
\n