Brazilian tribes fined for GMO soy crops on reservations

Chief Joao Ponce, head of the Uirapuru indigenous community, stands in a corn field near the town of Conquista do Oeste, Brazil, April 24, 2018. "We're surrounded by farmers. We can't live off hunting anymore. The animals are gone," he said. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino

CONQUISTA DO OESTE, Brazil (Reuters) - The savannah scrubland where Chief João Ponce once hunted deer and wild boar in Brazil has given way to neat rows of soy and corn that a tractor sprays with herbicide. In the next field, silver grain silos shimmer in the hot sun.

Ponce is head of the Uirapuru indigenous community which has allowed local farmers to produce crops on one-third of its 44,500-acre (18,000-hectare) reservation in southwestern Mato Grosso state.