Alcan has a terrible track record dealing with Indigenous people throughout the world. Here's the story in India.
Kashipur block in the Rayagada district of Orissa contains one of the largest deposits of bauxite ores in the world. For a company that relies on cheap and abundant sources of bauxite for their overall operations, the deposits in India are incredibly desirable. In 1993, a consortium of private companies, collectively known as UAIL (Utkal Alumina International Ltd), was formed to initiate a project to extract these ores and produce alumina. UAIL was initiated as a joint venture between Indal (India), Tata Industries (India), Norsk Hydro (Norway) and Alcan (Canada).
The local population and opponents to the project say that India’s constitution and Supreme Court rulings protect tribal areas from being expropriated by corporations. The state government, however, claimed the land as theirs and then handed the concession to Utkal Alumina International Ltd. (UAIL) Alcan, meanwhile, has consistently painted a picture of an accepting and gracious local population eager for the project to go ahead. Alcan has also been successful in hiding behind its rhetoric on corporate social responsibility and sustainable development in order to gloss over its participation in this destructive project.
See full report at Alcan't in India .
The project, which is slated for an area chiefly occupied by Adivasis (indigenous people of India), will lead to large scale displacement and loss of livelihood for the local population. The project, part of a broader program of industrialization in the state, will also result in massive environmental degradation. The people of Kashipur have opposed the project since its inception and their ten year struggle against the project culminated in deadly violence when police fired on a crowd of unarmed protesters killing three people.
