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Great, it looks like we are ready to get started. Welcome, everyone. Good morning. If you're here on the West Coast of the US and California as I am or good afternoon, if you're in another part of the world or good evening, depending on where you are, my name is Moira Burse and I am the climate and finance director at Amazon Watch and I am very pleased to be moderating this panel that will really eliminate both the risks and threats to the Amazon and to the indigenous peoples who live in the Amazon, but also the ways that European banks are supporting some of those threats to the Amazon rainforest and its people through their trade finance of oil trade. So I want to start, please, with the next slide, help with instructions on how to use the interpretation equipment. We will be having a panel of speak in Spanish. And I think we may have attendees who would prefer to listen to the material in Spanish. So if you are one of those people, please click on the glow button that you'll find at the bottom of your screen where it says interpretation and you will be given an option to listen to English. So that will help you if you want interpretation into English when the Spanish speaker is presenting, or please select Spanish if you would like interpretation into Spanish when English speakers are speaking. Please there are instructions on the screen and please post in the chat if you're having difficulties with that. And one of my colleagues can can help work you through it. Excellent. OK, next slide, please. So today we will here's our agenda. We'll hear first from yours truly with a brief introduction on on the reports that Amazon Watch and Stand recently released and on the Amazon secret headwaters region more generally. Angeline Robertson, who is an investigative researcher at the Stand Research Group, will present on the methodology of the report. We will then hear from my colleague, Kevin Koenig, who is the Climate and Energy Director at Amazon Launch, talking about the toxic legacy and future of Amazon crude in the region. We'll then be honored to hear from Marlon Bargues, who is the president of the of Cofernai, which is the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon, and he'll be speaking about really the impacts of the extractive industry, in particular the oil industry in in the Amazon and the impacts on indigenous peoples there. And then Tyson Miller, Sam's Forest Programs Director, will be talking about the global campaign that we are launching to to hold corporate actors accountable. And then we will have some time for questions and answers. I ask that folks, as your questions come up, please put them in the Q&A box. So at the bottom of your screen, next to where you found the globe for interpretation is a Q&A option and you can type in questions there. Colleagues of ours will answer questions that are sort of quick and easy. As we go ahead, they'll answer them in writing. And then we will note questions that are like a little bit more complex or particularly directed at one of the panelists that we can then answer in in the question and answer section. So please put your questions in the Q&A box and not in the chat. Thanks so much. All right, next slide. OK, so again, this this webinar is really focusing on and timed with the release of a new report from Stand Out Earth, a release just about a month ago in which we detailed how European banks are financing the trade of controversial oil from the Amazon secret headwaters region in Ecuador to international destination in the US, such as here in California. So first, I want to start with presenting why we were talking about the Amazon secret headwaters region in particular and what that even is. Next slide. So the Amazon secret headwaters region is located in the western Amazon and encompasses the headwaters that eventually flow into the Amazon river. The area covers over 74 million acres of rainforest and wetlands. Next slide. Yeah, the Amazon secret headwaters region is one of the most biodiverse places in the world. There are more species of trees grown in one hectare than in the US and Canada combined. Next slide. The secret headwaters region also contains the highest concentration of plant, bird, mammal and amphibian species in the Amazon and very likely the world. Next slide. And very importantly, this region is home to more than 20 indigenous nationalities representing over 500,000 people. And that includes people living in voluntary isolation. So indigenous nationalities that don't have contact with the outside world right now and are therefore extremely vulnerable. Next slide, please. So ecologically, the Amazon is not just important in the region, but globally. The volume of water that cycles through the Amazon can influence rainfall as far away as California, India and China. Next slide. And this one is particularly salient for me as I'm based in California and dealing with the wildfires that we're having right now. Some models show that the Amazon impacts 20 percent of California's rainfall, which is half of the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada mountains. And we could really use that rainfall right now here in California. Next slide. So as we've seen, there's a lot to defend and protect in the Amazon secret headwaters region, but that's all at risk from industrial extraction, in particular, oil drilling. Oil drilling in the Amazon rainforest is exceedingly harmful to the climate, to the biodiversity of the rainforest and to the many indigenous nations that are there. And this in part is due to the reckless nature in which the industry operates, which has led to massively harmful spills and other contamination, which we will hear about from other panelists in a bit. So that's why we think that any kind of investment in this industry deserves scrutiny and part of what led us to our report. Next slide, please. So our report reveals how since 2009, European banks and other private financial institutions have provided trade financing for approximately 155 million barrels of oil from Ecuador to refineries in the US for a total of $10 billion US. And actually more than 40% of those exports go to refineries in California alone and we'll be publishing new research on that very soon. So this oil contains approximately 66 million metric tons of carbon, which is equivalent to the annual emissions from 17 coal-fired power plants. And and as you see, if you if you click one more, you'll pop up another graph. Just make a click in the area. Thank you so much. So you see from this trend line, financial support to the Amazon oil trade has increased in recent years. So thus, we argue that these banks are actively complicit in the impacts of Amazon oil, which we'll hear about throughout this presentation, despite having made previous human rights and climate commitments. So now I'll pass it on to Angeline, who will explain the methodology in our report and and we will have a small section after Angeline presents for specific questions on the methodology before we get into more on the oil industry legacy impacts on the ground and the campaign. All right, Angeline, take it away. Thanks, Moira. Just a quick check if everyone can hear me fine. And to the next slide, please. So I'm going to be talking about methodologies for tracking Amazon oil and tracking trade financing for Amazon oil. And just to let you know, I'm a part of the Stand Research Group. I'm based out of British Columbia on the west coast of Canada. And the Stand Research Group has specialized in supply train research and investigations for over 15 years with an emphasis on fossil fuels and deforestation driver commodities. Our research reveals new leverage points, linkages, market driven actions and that help campaigns to create influence. And we have developed innovative methodologies to track commodities from physical points of negative environmental and or social impact to branded companies down the supply chain. To date, we've completed over 400 projects and our research has inspired over 100 corporate commitments to end deforestation and to help protect and we've helped protect over 30 million acres of forests. This research began in 2016 by our Stand Research Group director Greg Higgs. Very briefly, the idea here was to map all of the crude streams in the Amazon sacred headwaters using the API and sulfur content of the oil as defining characteristics and then linking the crude streams to U.S. energy information agency data on foreign crude oil imports by U.S. refineries depicted in this very simplified map. Greg realized that almost all of the oil exported from the Amazon came from Ecuador and the majority of it went to California. Next slide, please. The average proportion of Amazon oil exports breaks down between South American refining and consumption and North American refining and consumption with some minor consumption by the rest of the world. In California alone, Marathon and Chevron refineries consume 29 percent of the Amazon oil exported, while the rest of California refineries take on another 13 percent. This means, and next slide, please, that California has, on average, consumed, sorry, next slide, please, consumed about 42 percent of all Amazon oil exported annually in the last six years. That's a big share. Next slide, please. So what does the supply chain for Amazon sacred headwaters, from Amazon sacred headwaters to California look like for crude oil? Well, oil flows from the rainforest, from places such as the Napo T. Gray, which is home to uncontacted peoples, and Yasuni National Park, which is one of the most biodiverse places on the planet. Through the midstream and ends up at one of California's refineries. In this case, Chevron, El Segundo, one of the biggest consumers of Amazon oil in the world. Before it arrives there, it can go through several midstream trades. Now, in 2020, we revised our dataset and added an analysis of exports from Peru and Ecuador and imports from the United to the United States using US special tracking data or customs data. And we mapped out the distribution networks for diesel, gas and jet fuel in California. And from this, I calculated the average proportion of Amazon oil going to private and leaser fleets, gas stations, airports. And here you can see some of the major brands that be consuming Amazon oil. Next slide, please. As a result, a steady proportion of California's fuel consumption is Amazon derived. Over the past six years, approximately one in 10 gallons or 10% of jet fuel, gasoline and carb diesel pumped in the state comes from the Amazon sacred headwaters, a person could drive the length of the Amazon River 6.5 million times on the crude oil that California consumes from these headwaters annually. In addition, well, oh, no, sorry, just a back one slide, please. Thanks. In addition, while analyzing customs data for imports into the United States in the in the past 12 months, I noticed that Rabbo Bank was a consignee on a cargo of NAPO crude sailing from Esmeraldes in Ecuador to the port of Los Angeles. And this was unique because I knew the bank and I knew they had a strong sustainability commitment in a previous job I'd been in their offices in Utrecht to discuss for certification and financing and was familiarized with their sustainability practices. So as I sort of pulled the thread and I realized that even in just this last 12 months or my preliminary data set, there were at least six banks who were consignees on bills of lading, which means they were buying Amazon oil. A quick internet search revealed that they had similar sustainability commitments to Rabbo Bank. For example, they were signatories on the equator principles or they were signatories to the UN principles for responsible banking or even the collective commitment to climate action, which is a subset of the UN principles for responsible banking. And they also had various oil and gas finance exclusion policies, including, for example, excluding oil projects that do not have the free prior informed consent of indigenous peoples and excluding oil projects that occur in internationally recognized protected areas. Amazon oil, it qualifies on both of those fronts. So it was very interesting to me to see how far this went back. I bought nine more years of data to see if banks buying Amazon oil was a blip, a recent development or something else. Next slide, please. It turns out it was a major trend. Nineteen banks were involved in trading and trade financing for Amazon oil from the sake of headwaters from January 2009 to June 2020. The top six, UBS, Switzerland, Rabbo Bank, Natixis, ING Belgium, Credit Swiss and BNP Paravis, accounted for 85 percent of the volume of oil financed, about 155 million barrels of Amazon oil. The banks had extended an estimated $10 billion in credit to US refineries and oil companies to buy oil from the Amazon. And while the banks have all made various project finance commitments to emit extreme oil, all but one, Credit Swiss, had left trade financing out of the picture. And this is a major loophole. Banks who are making important strides on restricting project financing for climate, environment and indigenous rights are supporting the market for and profiting from the trade in Amazon oil. When indigenous leaders have been sounding the alarm for years that this oil is bad for them, bad for the climate, bad for the rainforest. Next slide, please. So how did we know that this was trade financing? One traditional method of trade finance is a letter of credit. It's usually extended by the bank to the seller on behalf of the buyer. And this is a very simplified diagram of the transactions included in a letter in letter of credit financing. Broadly, once the seller ships the goods, the bank receives the bill of lading, sends a payment and collects from the buyer. To ensure that the bank can collect from the buyer, they take delivery of the shipment, which means they're the consignee on the bill of lading in the customs data. And that therefore this type of transaction is traceable since the issuing bank or the bank that extended the credit is visible in the customs data. Additionally, since they're extending credit for on a transaction by transaction basis, we can estimate that the volume of financing is roughly equal to the landed value of the transaction. And that's how we get an estimate of approximately $10 million USD in trade financing. Next slide, please. We also identified that most of the banks were European and almost half were based in Switzerland. In fact, 33 percent of all globally traded oil is bought and sold in Geneva. This led to research on the Swiss transit trade in crude oil, revealing the risk to commodity producing countries such as Ecuador, of remaining poor and indebted while the midstream trade aided by trade finance shifts resource revenues out of the country. Transit trade is also a vehicle for illicit financial flows. This suggests that the structure of trade financing, not just the money that flows through it, can enable environmental destruction because trade financing injects liquidity into transit trade markets that are opaque and poorly regulated. Swiss researchers concluded that eight to 15 billion dollars USD per year is a realistic estimate of the illicit financial flows to Switzerland alone, related to the commodity trade. Given the data limitations due to lack of transparency and oversight, this number still must be approached as a conservative estimate. We must close the loopholes of trade financing and ask banks to be accountable for their role in Amazon forest destruction. Trade finance should be an explicit part of all bank oil exclusion policies. There can be no loopholes. Banks should also make trade financing contingent on better transparency and oversight for all commodities so that transit trade cannot profit from global inequity and financial secrecy. Thanks, Moira. I'll pass it back to you. Great. Thank you so much, Angeline. That was really clear. I don't see any questions about the methodology in the Q&A. If anyone has one urgent one that they want to type in immediately, please do so. But barring that, I think we can actually move on to our next panelist. I'll wait another minute or two when I see if anyone wants to throw up their proverbial hand for a question on methodology. But I'm not seeing that. So yeah, we can continue then with our next panelist, Kevin. And also folks can know in the audience that if you do have a question that does come up, then we can answer it in the Q&A at the end. And I do see a question about how have the banks responded and whatnot, and that will be something that we can address at the end in the general Q&A that's less about methodologies. So why don't we pass it on then to my colleague, Kevin Koenig from Amazon? Kevin, are you ready to present? I am. Thank you, Moira. And good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening, everyone. Yeah, I'm going to talk about why we need to close these financial loopholes that we just heard about on crude production in the Amazon because the extraction, the transportation of Amazon crude is devastating rain for US biodiversity, violating indigenous rights, and it's a time bomb for the planet. If we want to move this slide forward, perfect, great. Thank you. So I'm going to give a brief overview of oil's toxic legacy in Ecuador, current contamination from existing production and the threat of future expansion. Next slide. So oil extraction began in Ecuador in the 1960s. At that time, Texaco, now Chevron entered into pristine rainforests, the indigenous territory of five nationalities and began extraction. They built over 300 wells, 300 miles worth of roads, and it was devastating to the region and its people. You can see here, these stats on the right, Chevron operated there for 30 years, and these stats here are official. You know, these are official stats. So who knows what all the things that were happening that were not documented. Right. But essentially what happened there, you know, this infrastructure was an oil operations were built to spill. They basically constructed online waste pits. As you can see, here's a photo here, right? You can understand what happens there in a tropical rainforest where where it rains, those can overflow and spill directly into, you know, riverways, tributaries, etc. Texaco at the time, they basically save three dollars a barrel by not properly re-injecting toxic wastewater. So they dumped 4.3 gallons of produce waters directly into the Amazon ecosystem, directly into water that communities were using to drink, to fish, to bathe. The company also together with the Ecuadorian State Oil Company, Petro Ecuador, they built a transnational pipeline to extract crude from the Amazon 300 plus miles along at snakes along the coca river goes up over the Andes and down to the Pacific Coast, where the oil gets to there. You know, as I just explained, gets on boats and heads here to California. We'll hear more about that pipeline in a little bit. But the point is, you know, everything that was constructed out there was done on the cheap and basically because people and the Amazon, you know, we're not we're not important to to Chevron. And the devastation from those 30 years of extraction is a result of the ongoing litigation of Maria Ginda versus Chevron that a lot of you have probably heard about. This was the beginning of the extraction industry in Ecuador, and there's even, you know, we know that back in the day, Petro Brass from Brazil sent a team of engineers to this area to see how not to extract oil. Not that they're doing a better job of it in Brazil, but, you know, Texas Chevron was became the, you know, the poster child for reckless oil extraction operations in the Amazon. Next slide. Here's there we go. Yeah, so here's just an example of one of those toxic waste pits. There was a thousands of the thousand of those that were left behind. There has never been proper remediation of this area. There has never been clean water provided to the people by the company or the government. And there's never been any compensation to people that that live in this region. Next. So, you know, it's not a surprise then, right, that you have a high human, you know, the costs on the communities that live out there amongst this oil infrastructure is no surprise that people are sick, right? We see elevated levels of cancers, of respiratory ailments, miscarriages, birth defects, skin disease. This is here's a photo of Donia Rosanna and who lost her son to cancer. Next photo, please. So fast forwarding, you know, again, this region, you know, so we're talking about where current production is happening, has this toxic legacy of, you know, the start of back in the 60s and things have not gotten much better. It was mentioned earlier at the outset of a presentation about a recent oil spill that happened back in April, spilled 15,000 barrels, almost 30,000 Quechua indigenous people who live along this river have been then affected. You know, two pipelines ruptured, the state oil companies pipeline and the OCP pipeline. And these are, again, these are the pipelines that snake. They go from the Amazon over the Andes and they were built through along the Cocoa River and through an area known for seismic activity. They pass at the base of a volcano. So it's an incredibly risky area. And so the spill brought down both of those pipelines and one of the main reasons was due to regressive erosion from a dam project along the Cocoa River that basically, you know, brought down both of these pipelines. And the problem is that this erosion is continuing, right? So there's going to be an ongoing problem of spills along the pipeline route for the foreseeable future because the erosion is continuing and the government has no plan to to do anything about it. Next slide. Here is a photo you can see, you know, on the left, those are both of those pipelines, right? So that was just dumping, dumping crude into the rivers that the indigenous communities are using. Again, this is their source of water. It's their source, you know, also understand it's a pandemic, right? Out there. And so there's, you know, indigenous people, you need clean water not only to fish and bathe, but also and drink, but also to be, you know, during a time of pandemic. You need to be washing hands and you can't do that if your oil or your river is filled with oil. In response to basically to this contamination and these spills, indigenous people brought a legal action for emergency protective measures because the both the government nor the companies have been properly responding and during that, those hearings, which took place over the last couple of months, you know, some of the what we heard from companies, you know, were just absurd arguments, you know, things like, you know, nature replenishes itself, you know, all these justifications of why then you need to do the scope of cleanup that communities were were demanding. I had a stat on that last slide also about, you know, the company say they provided clean water to communities, but again, they gave them three liters of water per person per week when the World Health Organization estimate that what is needed for survival during a pandemic is 15, you know, so these communities have been abandoned by the state and by these companies. And disturbingly, both the Ministry of the Environment and these companies have called off their cleanup. They say it's done, it's cleaned up. And so and they're looking to just close the chapter on this. We can move forward to the next slide. Next slide, please. And yeah, let's go one more. Oh, sorry, back one. Back one more, back, back one more. Sorry, we're doing an old school and back one more. There we go. Great, thanks everyone for your patience. But another thing to just to talk about for a second when we talk about the current state of oil operations and concurrent state of contamination that's happening in this region is the gas flaring, right? It's a major source of respiratory ailments for communities that that live near these these separation stations. The flaring is not monitored at all by the government. Again, you can imagine, imagine asthma, respiratory ailments that all of these communities are dealing with, you know, again, particularly troubling during, you know, a pandemic of respiratory ailment and born illness, right? That's that's, you know, hitting people who have asthma, particularly hard. This is a this is a way in which we see contamination exacerbating the impact on local communities during a during a pandemic. One important thing here to note, though, well, two things I would say, you know, these gas flares are burning 24 seven. You can imagine, you know, you're in the middle of a rain forest. This is like a candle in the forest. You can if you've ever if you walked around the base of these, you can see, you know, the impact of the, you know, the biodiversity, etc. of an Amazon of the Amazon rainforest, you know, all kinds of animals and insects are drawn to that light and that that heat in in during the day and in the evening. So it's taking the toll on biodiversity. But what is very inspiring, though, is a group of young people that in communities that live near these these flares have brought legal action and very using similar arguments to the climate litigation that was seen in the United States brought by youth around the impact on climate and and future generations, right? OK, next slide. So now looking forward, right? And this is what's incredibly, you know, disturbing when. New expansion plans are in the works for expanding existing production, but then also new exploration, right? We see industry pushing deeper and deeper in the frontier forests, right? As all that easy oil has been extracted, they're looking for new reserves. Eddeline mentioned earlier plans, you know, where oil was coming from Yasuni National Park, the plans to develop wells there, we're looking at over 600, right? In an area that's a UNESCO biosphere reserve, there's indigenous people living in voluntary isolation. And of course, it's a it's a national park. Let's move. Let's move to the next slide. Let's see. Sorry. Yeah, one more. Perfect. This is the extraction plans for Ecuador's Amazon, right? You can see the areas that we were talking about that have been impacted by by Texaco, now Chevron and where a lot of the current production is. Those are all those light green blocks up there. The areas of new extraction are these yellow kind of gold colored ones in the bottom right hand corner of the southeastern part of Ecuador's Amazon. So, you know, the government plans, you know, because they've been so hard, they've been impacted by by the oil price crash, they've been impacted by by covid. And one of the ways they hope to restart their economy is by new oil extraction. So this is where the expansion is being planned. You know, it seems like the Amazon seems like the last place in the world that we should be looking for new fossil fuel reserves when we know that currently operating oil and gas fields alone will take the world beyond the one point five degrees Celsius limit. You know, we need to keep two thirds of fossil fuels in the ground. So why are we looking for why are we looking for more, right? And the worst case, the worst thing about what we're seeing here is that we're drilling for what are essentially unburnable hydrocarbons beneath standing forests, which are so essential for climate change mitigation. So, you know, that's where you kind of it is really a time bomb for the planet to be looking for unburnable oil, you know, non-Paris agreement, compliance extraction happening. Another thing to understand, too, is all these areas are indigenous territories. And so these blocks, the concessions are being handed out and they plan to be tendered to companies with no free prior informed consent of local indigenous peoples. Currently, Ecuador's Constitution, there is no regulation around obtaining the proper consent of indigenous communities. So these are, you know, we're seeing a egregious violation of indigenous rights to move forward in this area. The other thing also to just mention it was in that last slide is that, you know, the oil industry is a major driver of deforestation in the Western Amazon, right? Both there's a high correlation between deforestation in the individual blocks at the well site, but also, again, it's a driver, right? It's the oil industry is often the first, you know, industry to go into that frontier for us that then they open up well pads, they open up roads, and then it's agribusiness and other logging companies, etc. that follow that in, right? So next slide. Great. So, you know, what's the good news? You know, here is the good news, basically, you know, indigenous people on the ground through local organizing, through legal actions, you know, combined with international advocacy and the work that I think we all are doing around targeting these banks. It's it's been effective. It's been effective at keeping some of the worst egregious projects at bay. It's been effective at halting or at least slowing, right? The government plans to auction some of these new blocks. And I think it does send a huge message to two banks that, you know, there is an incredible amount of risk associated with these projects, we're seeing that resistance is effective. It's stranding these assets, it's stranding oil reserves, and that companies and banks that are involved in these projects, if you don't have a social license to operate, right? Your project is going to be fraught with problems. So I'm going to stop there and then I believe Marlon Vargas is going to follow it. He's going to take it from here about all the efforts of indigenous people are doing to defend their territories. Thank you so much, Kevin, for that illuminating presentation. And yes, we are going to hear now from Marlon Vargas, the president of the Federation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon. Marlon, we invite you to start the presentation and please put your video to be able to see you. Marlon, are you ready? Yes, I'm ready. Go ahead. I think it's going to be fine. Yes, Marlon, go ahead. Thank you very much for allowing us to the indigenous people of the Ecuadorian Amazon to be able to share and say what's going on. I have a problem there, I think. Thank you very much for the invitation. To all of you who are in this space. I want to first say in the name of the Federation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon, we are 11 nationalities, 23 organizations. We are in the northern, central and southern Amazon. For the last 50 years in the northern Amazon, we were told that the oil exploration was development of indigenous peoples. But in these hundreds of years of oil exploration in the northern Amazon, it has simply been the destruction of the mother nature, of the Pachamama, of our rivers, of our waterfalls, of our mountains, of our lakes, since the oil exploration has caused great damage to Chabrón-Texaco. And recently, there was a crane that was made in the Napo and Coca rivers, perjudicating more than 27,000 indigenous peoples who inhabit the shores of these two rivers. As well as in the southern Amazon, they have tried to make or build an hydroelectric power plant in the Piatua River, inside the Kicho territory of Pastaza. As well as the Block 22, they tried to explore and exploit the oil inside the Guadrani territory of the Block 22. As well as the Block 28, which they are trying to perforate and exploit the oil. The Block 28 is between, especially in the province of Pastaza, it is more or less by the National Park of the Yanganates, which from there come millions of eyes of water to give rise to the Pastaza rivers, Napo, Coca, Morona, and, therefore, to the Marañón River and to the Amazon. To exploit the oil in that territory, especially in the Amazon, the southern center would be deadly for us as an extinction of peoples. As well as mining companies, woodworks, among other things, all kinds of extractivism that have tried to enter arbitrarily, in an unconsulted way, respecting the collective rights of the Constitution as well as international treaties. And this has been thanks to the financing of the great economic corporations in this sense, banks, which practically only finance to be able to exploit the oil, the hydroelectric mining, among others. This is happening in Tundain, in the province of Zamora Chinchipe, a company that is settled in that area, in the territories of the German Schwart. Alisa has violated all kinds of collective rights, human rights. For example, when the state of deception and the touch of queda in Ecuador, the transnational companies did not respect this state of deception and the touch of queda. They simply continued working with normality in the entire Amazon. So much so, the mining, hydroelectric, oil companies. That was the reason for the indigenous peoples to get infected with COVID-19. And today, in these moments, a lot of people are dying. A lot of people are infected. Men, women, elderly people, children and girls in the entire Ecuadorian Amazon. Therefore, we, as a company, have come fighting against all these types of frauds of our rights. But the authorities, especially the national government, have not respected the collective rights, the human rights that are in the constitution, that the territories of nationalities have to be respected, as well as the international treaties that pray in favor of nationalities and their territories. This has been thanks to the financing of different banks in the world for transnational companies. Therefore, banks, instead of financing oil companies, mining, hydroelectric, all kinds of extractivism, they would have to support the nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon region, so that nationalities can undertake another type of economic development, but without pollution, without damaging the mountains, the rivers, the waterfalls, the lakes. Those banks would have to finance nationalities to take care of their territory, so that they can do another type of innovation, especially tourism. Lost a bit of connection with Marlon, but let's wait a second to see if it comes back. Oh, he may have just dropped off. Oh, Marlon, you lost it, but it seems like you're back. You're silent. Marlon, you're silent. You can turn on the audio. And that's how we hear you. Marlon, please reactivate. I think we're fine. We're back. Now, yes. We're fine. I'm going to point out, saying that the banks of the world, the great corporations of the world, would have to stop financing these oil companies, hydroelectric mines, all kinds of extractivism, because they would simply be accomplices of the destruction of Mother Nature. Because it's not just ending Amazon, it's not just ending the lives of indigenous people, but ending the lives of all the peoples of the world, of all the living beings of the whole world. Because what will happen to a world without water, a world without oxygen, a world without food, a world without biodiversity, a world without cultures? It would be a world that is simply dead, lost, a perverse world, that only extracts, kills Mother Nature, simply thinking about the economic power, the capital power. Therefore, banks have simply come to support the capital power, to fulfill these interests of the multinationals. Therefore, banks, instead of financing the destruction of the planet, would have to finance indigenous peoples for their development, for the strengthening, especially the care of the environment. From here to here, indigenous peoples in the Ecuadorian Amazon have come defending our jungle, our territories. Therefore, I bow to all the brothers and sisters in the world, to the gentlemen, to the authorities, to the owners of the banks, not to finance them. Because if you continue to finance the transnational, the multinationals, you will also live this destruction of Mother Nature. What would happen if the bankers didn't have water? What would happen if the bankers didn't have oxygen? Therefore, I think it's time to change the destiny of the world, the destiny of the planet. Therefore, from the confederation of indigenous nationality of the Ecuadorian Amazon, we are here to defend the life of humanity, to defend nature. It is to defend the life of humanity. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Marlon. Thank you very much for all the words and all the work you do. Thank you so much to Marlon for all of the work that he does and for his very important words. It's absolutely necessary to understand the perspective of the people who are being impacted by these policies and by these activities and really appreciate Marlon's time. So now I'm going to pass the mic, the proverbial mic, on to Tyson Miller, which stand dot earth. Who's going to talk about the global campaign? Can you go ahead, Tyson? And at least I please thank you. Yes, sharing the slides again. Thank you. Apologize for the background noise. Try and get that addressed in a sec here. But thank you so much for your for sharing your vision and for calling for what needs to happen. It's an honor. Great with you and for you to be on this call. Before I dive into what's next relative to the campaign, I will just give a little bit of a background on the sacred headwaters as a whole. And just perfect timing. So it's Amazon sacred headwaters is an indigenous led initiative, binational initiative in Ecuador and Peru and with allies such as Amazon Watch, Stand on Earth, Fundacion, Pachamama, Pachamama Alliance and others. And you know, the indigenous federations are unified in their vision for an end to extraction expansion of oil, mining and other extractive industries. And part of that campaign is the international arm, which is connecting the oil to the banks, financing the flow of it, but also to the brands. And, you know, regions that are that are in the oil, at least if you could advance the slide, that would be great. One more. Yeah. And so one more, please. They have put forth in another one, sorry, a declaration that was announced at COP 25 in Madrid, really establishing very firmly their vision for this end to extraction, but also advancement of solutions pathways for this region. And there's much more contained on the Amazon's Sacred Headwaters website. So sacredwaters.org or quenca sagrada.org. And it's a, you know, it's a level of international coverage and visibility of the sacred headwaters. It's that time in the course of the year. Reuters has been covering the sacred headwaters in a variety of stories starting with International Day of Biodiversity and then did a comprehensive coverage of the release of this report that got picked up by over 300 news outlets across the world. Additionally, it's it's interesting to see the ripple effects of this report and the findings we just found out that the Bloomberg Intelligence Report is retching this specific report and some of their recommendations and intelligence to the financial sector. So we're happy to see that think that there are ripple effects from the report. So where we're at right now is we have engaged in deep dialogue with five of the six banks. Right now, the top six banks identified one bank probably after the spill in May, Rabo Bank stopped financing the oil trade in their words permanently from the region. And we're engaged with the other five of the top six banks to do two things. Essentially, right now, on the ground, because of inappropriate response to the spill and the likelihood of future spills, Indigenous Federations and Allies are saying there needs to be an end to current production until the government responses adequately addressing, remediating the spill, preventing the future spills, fortifying the infrastructure, et cetera. So there's this ask of the banks to for this moratorium in a short term. And in the long term, there's an ask for the banks to essentially have some of their project finance and their trade finance policy commitments line up and make a commitment to no financing of this oil unless the government of Ecuador commits to no new expansion consistent with the Paris climate chords and the like. So that's in essence our ask of the top six banks. We are also in the process of reaching out to the remaining 12 banks who are still connected, but just to a much smaller amount to about 15 percent of the financing over the last decade of the oil from the region. So that's in process. It's a short of engagement. We are our approach will be sort of hiding kind of a leaders and lab approach. We're hoping to uplift leadership in the sector and are eager to do that in the course of the dialogue with the banks that we're connected with right now. And our plan with allies in Europe and globally is to really shine a much brighter and wider spotlight on laggards and lack of leadership. So we're in a very narrow window of engagement at the present moment. As was mentioned earlier, we're also a lot of this this this banks research or this this report in the findings came from a broader body of work that Angelina is also leading and from a standard research group. And that's connecting the oil from the Amazon Sacred Headwaters region to California, there's one in 10 gallons pumped are from the region in states and connecting that oil to brands and other large institutions and trying to really advance policy solutions, but also the the large institutions using the oil to push them to make commitments to stop in essence similar to the commitments we're aiming for with with these financial institutions. So that's kind of our international campaign in a nutshell. We are always, you know, one of our goals is to advance strategic communications. And so, you know, that's obviously in connection with the new findings, the new research, but in other means as well. And really, we are hopeful that this international part of the campaign helps to generate controversy, show leaders in Ecuador, but also Peru, that large institutions are very concerned about the the continuing and expanding march of extraction, the impacts on indigenous peoples and their rights and to, you know, chart a different course. So that's part of our strategy is to support that indigenous leadership and their demands and their vision on the ground and at the same time to support the, you know, the lifting up of solutions pathways. So there's later on in the year, and I believe even later on in this week, really wonderful allies on the ground and indigenous federations will be releasing solutions, pathways, frameworks and visions for what is possible in this region, kind of dreaming a new dream. And so this international campaign where, you know, connecting the controversy is really designed to, you know, they support those solutions on the ground. So with that, I'll take it back to you, Moira. Thank you so much, Tyson. Next slide, Alicia, if you don't mind, a couple more slides to go, because I do want to take advantage of my privilege as moderator to mention some additional work that Amazon Watch has done to track the financing of the oil industry in the Amazon. That's the right slide, the investing one. Yep, thank you so much. So in March of this year, Amazon Watch published a report called Investing in Amazon Crude and we looked at the biggest US and European financiers of some of the most controversial oil extraction projects in the Western Amazon. And what we found was that BlackRock, HSBC, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase and Citi were the top five US and European financial institutions invested in these controversial companies to the tune of billions of dollars over the past few years. And so we I wanted to bring this into the conversation as well to be able to note that while the bulk of this presentation and of course, the report that we stand and Amazon Watch collaborated on together was focused on trade finance, there are other aspects of finance that are really important to pay attention to and are part of this bigger conversation about the role of finance in either supporting human rights, supporting climate action, supporting the protection of biodiversity, or in in harm in all of those things. And one more slide to that effect. Thanks. So stand Amazon Watch and dozens of other organizations released last week, a set of guidelines for financial institutions on how to actually be aligned with the Paris Accord in their lending. You can find it at ran.org slash principles. Our colleagues at Rainforest Action Network led this effort and so it's available on on Ram's website. And I really wanted to draw folks' attention to this because we really wanted to make clear what actions are required for finance giants to truly align the climate impact of their business practices with the Paris Agreement. We know that banks are starting to come out with and we just saw from Morgan Stanley this week, an example, they're starting to come out with commitments to things like net zero and and other terms that get thrown around and and those terms can sound positive, but they actually need to translate into concrete action and that's important both for climate protection as well as for the protection of extremely important ecosystems like like the Amazon. So I will now move it on to two questions. Alicia, thank you so much for the slide help. You can take down the slides that way. We can see all of the panelists because I think we'll probably jump around between panelists for answering some of these questions. I see a few more have come in, but I've noted several that have been popping up through the presentation. And so first, maybe let's go to Kevin. There are some questions about both the lawsuit that you mentioned with regards to the oil spill. If you can talk about where that was filed against against or in what court in what jurisdiction. And then there was another question about the fact that the Exeterine Constitution has a race of major provision, why is the current administration so resistant to responding to this bill and to indigenous communities? And then we have some other questions about sort of examples of success. How do we know that we're that we're being successful in our efforts to push back against this destruction? And then we'll move on to some of the other questions. Thanks. Sure, great. Thanks, Moira, and thanks to all for these questions. Yeah, I mean, quickly on the spill, the lawsuit on the oil spill, it's basically it was filed. It's it's actually for emergency kind of precautionary measures, right? And it was basically filed calling for that from from the Ministry of Health, Environment, Hydrocarbons, and then specifically at the Ecuador State run oil company Petroequidor and then OCP, which is the operator of the second pipeline. It's a consortium. There's several different companies that are part of that consortium. So, you know, it was basically asking for a kind of emergency like inductive relief and that would provide more resources to to the communities and yeah, and proper proper cleanup. I believe is a week and a half ago that that order was rejected by the court in in the Amazon in the in the province of Sukumbeos in the town of Koka. So that was rejected. The communities are planning on appealing, but, you know, the government is basically the judicial system has been dragging its feet. They haven't even provided the final verdict in written form to the communities, which is the legal obligation to do within 24 hours. They haven't complied with that. You know, we're now almost two weeks out and that's preventing them from filing their their appeal. So, you know, we kind of a scenario where, you know, not surprisingly right, but in this case, it seems like the judiciary is very much being manipulated and controlled by the influence of industry. Right. And, you know, the other lawsuit that I made reference to was obviously the Chevron litigation, which I think many people know and it probably filed right, but that was where an Ecuadorian court found Chevron basically liable for, you know, nine point five billion. Chevron has refused to pay or clean up, pulled its assets out of the country and is still basically on the run. And it's forced communities to try to go after their assets in other countries. On the rights of nature question, I mean, that's a great one. You know, Ecuador was the first country to enshrine rights of nature into their into their constitution. And I think there were a lot of high hopes that, you know, that that would really provide sort of effective measure of holding companies and government to account. Unfortunately, it hasn't. You know, it is being used in several different legal cases. But at this point, you know, I think in practice, we've just seen that it has not, you know, while it's great on paper, it has not really provided the kind of, you know, unique and necessary protection for sort of ecosystems as a whole. And to sort of do what it should, right? It was it was trying to turn nature from an object of rights into a subject, right? And that just has not played out, unfortunately. The good thing is that it's there, right? And you would hope that the judiciary or, you know, administrations, you know, in the future would, you know, that will be respected. Yeah, it hasn't. But again, I think it's still a really important tool that's there. And I think, you know, as we know, it's inspired and was in part inspired from a movement around rights of nature that's happening all over, you know, in local municipalities in the United States to, you know, New Zealand and all around. So and then a couple of things, I mean, examples of victories. I mean, I think it's important to, you know, to sort of to take a step back, right? And if you looked, I mean, I've been in Amazon Watch for 20 years. I worked in the region for probably 25. And I remember, you know, that some of the plans that were on the books for the Amazon back then, I mean, had the government and companies had their way, there would be no pristine forest left in Ecuador, right? Like they wanted oil and energy infrastructure and that of other extractive industries like mining and dams to, you know, to basically take over the whole the whole Amazon, right? That was the plan. And I think, you know, while, you know, in my presentation, we looked at that map and they have, you know, you look at all those oil blocks that are up for auction. And, yeah, that's a really scary, scary prospect. And it's important to know that, you know, the government has been trying to auction those blocks for many number of years, right? And the list of companies that have pulled out of the Ecuadorian Amazon because and the Peruvian Amazon, because of indigenous resistance. I mean, there's there's a lot of them, right? You got Conoco Phillips, Arco, Burlington Resources, CGC, Geopark, Talisman and I think what happens. And so we know, right, that the areas that we're talking about are not permanently protected. So we're sort of in a scenario where, you know, we, you know, we're forcing these companies out. And yeah, that means that another company may come in. But what's happening over time is it's creating a legacy of controversy that ends up dissuading new investment. So these areas are becoming, you know, they're on the radar of companies of like, that is a bad place to do business, right? And I think that the report from the Bloomberg analysts that Tyson mentioned underscores exactly that point. This is a bad place to do business, you know, not only because, you know, it's going to, you know, it affects you or brand and what have you, but also the very risks of these projects aren't going to move forward. In Ecuador, there's a case recently too, Andes Petroleum, right? Which is a basically a company comprised of Chinese National Petroleum Company, CNPC and CENOPEC, right? Two state-run companies. They had a contract, a four-year exploration contract to drill for oil in two blocks, block 79 and 83 on the territory of the Zapata indigenous nation. You know, 400,000 hectares of pristine roadless rain forest. And the company had to declare force major and they were recently granted that designation and are getting out of their contract because the force major that happened was indigenous resistance. They got this contract and they couldn't get any work done because indigenous people took over the airstrips, they prevented planes for coming in and there were international actions. We did actions at the Chinese Embassy here in the Bay Area. There were actions in New York, in Washington. And so I think that and I'll stop with this, but I think, you know, as we know with everything, there's no silver bullet, right, to how this stuff works. And you need to it's sort of a the recipe of how of how you win is complex. But I think over the years, we've figured out that there are some elements that you certainly need to be happening, right? And it starts with on the ground capacity building and on the ground organizing and resistance. And then you combine that with I think some of the work that our NGOs are doing, which, you know, internationally pressuring the companies, pressuring the banks, pressuring the traders. And, you know, you combine all of that and as well, looking at California as the major consumer of this, of crude that's coming. I mean, that's another area that we are that we are working to push California as, you know, who has the market share of this crude to also take action. So, you know, you combine all of those and these are giving us benchmarks, even though that, you know, there's a lot that is being planned, but I think I think we're advancing and, you know, again, the goal is permanent protection, but all these victories along the way are helpful at dissuading at least some of the worst projects from happening. Thanks so much, Kevin. That was really helpful. We have several questions that get to the issue of how we actually hold the financiers accountable, whether there are legal restrictions that can be put on them and then also questions about how, whether it's more impactful to go after sort of the biggest investors, the investors with the most money or those, the smaller investors that maybe are a little bit more move, you know, a little bit more potentially movable or that have more of a social responsible bent to begin with. Maybe Tyson, would you be willing to start off with those? And of course, you can always tag another panelist if you'd like. Sure, I think it's a great question and pursuing a both and strategy. As mentioned, prior, the top six banks identified represent about eighty five percent of the trade financing, so we kind of have focused there. And next is the outreach and engagement with 12 other institutions that collectively represent about 15 percent of that volume. So we'll be we'll be doing both. It's a great question. I mean, hopefully we can see real, meaningful, concrete leadership that we can uplift and sort of create some ripple effects. Was there another question, Mara? Yeah, just sort of about what are the most effective ways to try to hold these financial institutions accountable, whether it's legal mechanisms through the UN, public pressure, what do you think are the most effective ways? I mean, I think for a lot of institutions, I don't know that there's, well, I think there is some legal risk, actually. I think I think we need to sort of explore that in a more robust way. But for the most part, I think it's it's a risk to their brands. And a lot of these these bank policies that are meant to be focused on their project finance and it might touch on, you know, non impacting biodiversity or national parks or, of course, indigenous rights. And so if if there's if the loophole is trade finance, there's not integrity, that there's a violation of the spirit of the policy. And so our strategy is drawing attention to that discrepancy and targeting their brands. And then, you know, there is their they have folks that likely asset managers and others connected to to them. And so, you know, we're in the midst of refinement of our strategy. But the early stage here is is is focusing on them and their brands and the lack of integrity here. Angelina, I don't know if you want to add anything to that or Kevin. OK, I'm not seeing Angelina or Kevin jump in. Thanks, Tyson. So we have a couple of questions that maybe I will punt the two, Angelina, about about how how how the debt that Ecuador holds plays into this. And and also if you want to speak to a question about is there a good bank that we know isn't invested in in the first station and other problematic things, if you feel willing to answer that, too. And if not, I can try to take an effort out of it. The first question, because I have a short answer, the second question first, because I have a short answer for that, which is I'm not sure that all banks themselves would know if they're involved in deforestation or in environmental destruction through their financing practices. When we approach banks, they were surprised in some cases to know that we could trace trade financing. So I can't answer the question and say that there are banks that would be, you know, completely clean of any kind of accountability with regards to environmental destruction. But I also would say we're not sure that the banks themselves would know in every case. On the second question about Ecuador's debt yet, and there is an interesting dynamic that happens. And I touched on it a little bit in my presentation about commodity producing countries and they get locked into like a resource curse. It's been called where they're having to produce more and more and forcing more of their GDP to be focused on a single commodities. But actually, they're borrowing money against those commodities at the same time. And so they're forced to keep producing, despite the fact that they may not be profiting. And this type of interaction is not unique to Ecuador, but it certainly highlights the fact that if Ecuador has as they have done debt for oil swaps or oil back loans, they essentially have committed to daylighting oil in the country in order to pay back the country's debt. And that means that they're forced in a way to continue to extract oil, despite potentially not profiting or potentially having dire environmental consequences for Ecuadorian people. And that means that there is a link that needs to be broken between either oil back loans in the case of Ecuador or if you look at Venezuela, it's prepayment for oil. They're borrowing money from midstream traders or borrowing, but they're accepting payment from midstream traders for their oil four years in advance. And so they're locked in to extracting this oil, no matter what the market's doing and with some caveats on that. But just to be very broad and succinct, there the we cannot solve the oil extraction problem for the Amazon without also understanding the inequalities between first world, banks and midstream traders profiting from the trade in commodities that come from the developing world. And I touched on that a little bit. It's a very complicated interaction that exists in supply chains. But it does have to do with transit trade through countries like Switzerland and the financial flows and profits out of developing nations. Their resource revenues are not staying in the country. And that that has to be solved as well for really for countries like Ecuador to have a chance at some longer term economic vision that could include them having a real sovereignty over how they extract or manage or sustainably develop their resources. Thank you, Angeline. I believe Marlon is still here and I wanted to give him the opportunity to answer some of the questions about indigenous land rights. So, folks, if you need interpretation into Spanish, make sure you have that option turned on. Marlon, are you able to respond to a question about the rights of indigenous indigenous territories? OK, he may be logged on, but not paying attention, which is fair. Marlon, can you hear me? Marlon is there, please. OK, seems like he is not not focused on this, which is totally understandable. He has a lot going on as the president of the Ecuadorian Indigenous Federation of the Amazon. So we can we can go back to some other answering some of the other questions in our last few minutes here. So let me see. Oh, Marlon. Yes, Marlon. There are some questions about asking about what the rights of indigenous peoples and their territorial rights are, if I could explain a little bit the panorama of what exists against the rights of indigenous people in Ecuador and the ways in which the rights are being demanded. Let's see, we demand our rights, especially what is in the Ecuadorian Constitution and collective rights in Article 57, which says that the territories of the nationalities, especially the indigenous peoples or the indigenous communities will not be displaced by their territories and many times have been displaced by their territories. For example, in Tundain, in Nankins, our companions were displaced by their territories, by their territories, obeying, above all, the great economic capital of the transnationalities. That has been one of the mistakes that has been made. And in the Constitution, it says, for example, it has to do with prior, free, informed consultation, free consent. That has not existed. It does not exist. For example, in the Constitution, it says in the popular consultation of Ecuador, it was said that the territorial rights of our brothers, free peoples, Tagaers and Taromenanes are respected, but nevertheless, the road advances the territories of these brothers, there in the Yasuni. So there is no right. We demand that there is the truth, above all, the true prior, free, informed consultation, free consent, but in all the territories of the nationalities. We have said that the nationalities do not have the export of oil, mining and hydroelectric, but rather employ and go for another development. That has not been respected. Neither the Constitution of Ecuador nor the international treaties are respected. Simply, the indigenous peoples are disempowered by the authorities, because the authorities go in favor of transnationalities, the judges, the fiscal men of competent authorities of Ecuador go in favor of the authorities. That is what happened in the province of Orellana, by this derrame of the crude, that produced, above all, in the Napao and Coca rivers. The judge, Jaime Oña, went in favor of OCP and as well as Petro-Ecuador. That means that the state does not recognize its mistakes that it is making, of the mistakes that they are making, because many people are dying from different diseases. For example, cancer. There, the Ministry of Health does not act. For example, above all, the ministry, the ministries that are in charge of the Ministry of Hydrocarbons, among other ministries, they deny that there was, deny the derrame of the crude that was produced by these lands, by the territories of the nationalities. Also, that is why, when we know all these obstacles to human rights, we have, from the committee, we have taken forward the initiative of the sacred wells. We have reached an agreement with the Peruvian jungle, between Aidesepi and the committee, to leave all kinds of extractivism under ground, and to adopt another development without contamination, without destroying our territories. There are some experiences that the territory of Chor, for example, with the Capawi Hotel, in Limoncocha, there are so many initiatives that do give results. But to the states, especially the state of Ecuadorian and the national government, what interests them is to destroy the nature and extract the oil, all kinds of minerals that exist within the territories of the nationalities, but without consulting. And that is why, as there is no consulting, we come out to protest resistance, and when we come out to reject the oil, mineral and hydroelectric activity in our territories, they tell us that we are terrorists, that we are enemies of development, they criminalize us, they put us in jail, more judges, among others. Therefore, this, we do emphasize that we have to adopt another development, because another development in the territories of the nationalities, if it is possible, and not to extractivism in the territories of the nationalities, because they have come bolstering the rights and they will continue to bolster the rights of the territories of the nationalities of the indigenous peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon. Thank you very much, Marlon. Thank you very much, Marlon. Unfortunately, we have reached the end of our time for this webinar, so we are going to have to wrap up. There are some really interesting questions left, most of which are getting answered in writing by my colleagues. And I just want to close on a quick note, emphasizing something that Marlon said, you know, there are a lot of rights on paper in the Constitution or in the laws, but in fact, those aren't being upheld and respected by governments. A lot of times, and that's part of why we need to be able to push them, whether it's in protest, whether it's in public pressure, whether it's in naming and shaming, so that companies and governments are actually responding to the needs of the people and of our planet. So I thank you so much for your time, for your attention. You can contact either of our organizations via our websites, AmazonWatch.org, and stan.earth, and please take care and be safe.