For nearly a decade, Colombia’s principal palm companies have tried to distance themselves from atrocities that occurred in 2001 in Colombia’s Pacific state of Chocó. Illegal paramilitary groups murdered black subsistence farmers, drove hundreds more from their lands and cut down thousands of acres of collectively owned primary forest, which businesses then seized for palm-oil production. Law-abiding palm companies that had nothing to do with the invasion of Afro-Colombian land saw their reputations sullied in articles in the world press, expressions of concern by the Congressional Black Caucus in the United States and a condemnation of the takeover by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Companies that had behaved uprightly sought to clear their name. One tactic was to join the... [Log in to read more]