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Protecting the 'Lungs of West Africa'

July-Aug 2019

Author: Veronique Mistiaen

In: New Internationalist, 2019, pp. 54-56

Conversation with Alfred Brownell, Liberian environmental lawyers recorded by Veronique Mistiaen. Brownell has been involved in a seven year campaign which succeeded in protecting half a million acres of Liberia's tropical rainforest from the Southeast Asia-based Golden Veroleum company, which had been granted the right by the government to clear and use the land to grow palm oil. He took up the cause of the indigenous community in Sinoe County whose forests and cultural sites were being destroyed by the company. The article outlines how the campaign succeeded and Brownell's wider role in creating the Alliance for Rural Democracy throughout Liberia to work for environmental justice. He had been forced by death threats to move with his family to the USA.