(31 Mar 2009)
1. Pull out from Christ the Redeemer statue to wide of wall being built in Dona Marta shanty town
2. Construction workers working on wall
3. Pan of wall
4. Various of workers
5. Wide of wall
6. Set up of President of Rio de Janeiro state's public works department Icaro Moreno
7. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Icaro Moreno, President of Rio de Janeiro state's public works department:
"We decided to build this physical barrier to show both the community and society that we are protecting the environment and the rainforest and also to show the residents that they can only build up to a certain point, they cannot build beyond this point."
7. Pan of wall
8. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Icaro Moreno, President of Rio de Janeiro state's public works department:
"We are simply asking residents to continue to build within the limits we have established. We have already seen a lot of environmental damage and, quite frankly, many of these homes have been built in high risk flood areas, so it will benefit the residents as well."
9. Mid of Dona Marta resident Maria da Graca Martins da Silva in her home
10. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Maria da Graca Martins da Silva, Dona Marta resident:
"I support the construction of this wall because they told us they are going to build new houses here, where I am. So, I am happy about that because I will be moving into a new home. What I am not happy about is that they are going to get rid of all my plants back here."
11. Da Silva in her garden
12. Various of workers making bricks used to construct wall
STORYLINE:
Rio de Janeiro's state government will build 11 kilometres (seven miles) of concrete barrier walls around some of the city's largest shanty towns in an effort to halt deforestation of the jungle surrounding the city, officials said Tuesday.
The project will cost 17 million (m) US dollars this year and will see the 10-foot-high walls built around sections of at least 11 shantytowns, said Icaro Moreno, president of the state's public works department.
Standing atop the Dona Marta shantytown in the shadow of Rio's famed Christ statue, Moreno pointed to the first of the gray concrete walls to go up, work on which started a few weeks ago and which is now 100 meters long.
Moreno said the Atlantic rain forest is being lost more and more each year. "Now, we're setting limits on where these communities can expand," he said, gesturing toward to the lush green jungle on the other side of the wall.
Brazil's National Institute for Space Research, which monitors forest destruction, reported in December that between 2005 and 2008, deforestation of Rio's urban rainforest had doubled as compared to the previous three years.
About 205 hectares (506 acres) were destroyed in the last three years.
Some 600 houses in the 11 shantytowns will have to be destroyed to make way for the walls, Moreno said.
People living in those homes will be provided with new government-subsidised housing.
Moreno said many of the homes built outside the limited area are sitting a top of areas which run a great risk of floods or mudslides during rainy season.
For resident Maria das Gracas Martins da Silva, the possibility of getting a new home is exciting. However, she is sad to see her makeshift backyard destroyed by the construction of the wall.
As workers in blue uniforms and hard hats lugged 50-kilo (110-pound) sacks of cement up painfully steep stairs in front of her abode, Silva said most people living in Dona Marta didn't see the wall as segregating them from the rest of Rio, anymore than the poverty they lived in, though doubts lingered.
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