On May 10, Houston based ConocoPhillips, the nation’s third largest oil and gas company, held its annual shareholders meeting after celebrating a year of record profit. The meeting drew a crowd of people who confronted the company’s stance on environmental policies and human rights. Shareholders inside the meeting also challenged the company with record high votes for a resolution that requires a report on potential environmental damage that could result from drilling in environmentally sensitive areas.

Among those leading the protest were native Amazonian leaders including: Domingo Ankuash (Shuar from Ecuador), Andres Sandi (Achuar from Peru) and Jose Gualinga (Kichwa from Ecuador), all of whom were decorated in the traditional garb of their native tribes to defend what many call “the lung of the earth.” They traveled from the Ecuadorian and Peruvian rainforests via foot, canoe, bus and plane to confront the Houston based oil conglomerate with a clear message: “No trespassing on our ancestral lands!”

Outside the meeting, voices chanted and echoed “Kichwa, Achuar, and Shuar.” A crowd stood holding signs and patiently listened as Gualingua spoke through a translator. He painted a dismal portrait of divided communities, loss of culture and resources, and a decrease in autonomy that have occurred since the oil companies entered his homeland.

Nearly 100,000 people make up the Shuar, Achuar and Kichwa tribes who inhabit Ecuador and Peru’s more pristine and unprotected rainforests. For decades these tribes have fought an uphill battle to keep logging, mining and oil companies out of their homelands. They hope to prevent the widespread turmoil that has fated other Amazon tribes due to toxic contamination and displacement of indigenous peoples.

“Our people have been living in harmony with the rainforest since the beginning of time,” says Domingo Akuash. “We’ve seen the oil contamination in other parts of the Amazon, which is leading to the disappearance of indigenous peoples. Therefore we won’t allow any oil company to get a single drop.”

With ConocoPhillips’ acquisition of Houston based Burlington Resources in March 2006, the company also gained Burlington’s interests in three separate oil concessions totaling an estimated two million acres in Shuar, Achuar and Kichwa homelands. Against the clearly stated position of local indigenous peoples, Burlington repeatedly attempted to gain entry into these three separate oil concessions.

“Conoco is at a crossroads. Their Ecuadorian and Peruvian concessions represent political, moral and financial liabilities that pose serious risk to the company’s reputation and bottom line,” says Kevin Koenig, Amazon Watch program coordinator. “The price of gas is already high enough without ConocoPhillips having a protracted confrontation with these indigenous peoples, who only wish to protect their ancestral lands and communities from the inevitable impacts of oil drilling in such an environmentally and culturally sensitive area.”

The company’s holdings in the Amazon rainforest now exceed those of any other U.S. oil company challenging their commitment to the environment and good corporate citizenship. Since the company’s take over of Burlington, the company has been completely silent on these issues.

On the company’s website, a commitment to Health and Environmental Policy states:

The practices of companies like ConocoPhillips raise serious questions for Gualinga, who asks “what drives oil companies to exploit and treat us this way?”

Akuash expands on this issue by claiming that it’s not that these tribes don’t want to be integrated into the global economy, but they don’t want to be forced into it. “We just want to be respected,” he says.

During the meeting company executives publicly stated that the company's involvement in these remote areas of the Amazon is under review. No final decions have yet to be reached on whether Conoco will continue its operations in the Amazon.

Also in the spotlight of shareholder concerns was a new resolution on drilling in protected areas, which asked the company to prepare a report on the potential environmental damage that would result from drilling for oil and gas inside the National Petroleum Reserve. The resolutions was presented by Green Century Capital Management, a company that primarily focuses on environmentally responsible investing, and requires that the report be made available to investors by 2007.

Shareholders voted 25.8 percent in favor of the resolution, making it the highest vote ever received concerning wilderness preservation.

This historically high vote guarantees that the resolution will be on next year’s agenda.

“Over a quarter of the shareholders of an oil company have said, ‘Sometimes you shouldn’t drill. You should have to consider the environmental cost,’” says Andrew Shalit of Green Century Capital Management. “We hope ConocoPhillips and other oil companies will take that message to heart and develop policies to protect the world’s most sensitive ecosystems.”

Previously, under the 1998 Record of Decision, approximately 580,000 acres of the National Petroleum Reserve were unavailable for oil and gas leasing because the area encompassed critical habitat for caribou and goose molting. The resolution argues that drilling in this sensitive area would spoil these habitats and significantly impact Alaskan natives who depend on the natural environment for sustained life.

Also introducing a new resolution was the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Episcopal Church. The resolution called for the board of directors to report to shareholders concerning how the corporation ensures accountability for its environmental impacts in all of the communities where it operates.

Harry Van Buren, who represents the group, says the main reason this resolution was introduced stems from a belief that any company that has operations that effect local communities should be accountable. The group has a particular concern for economically disadvantaged communities which often bear the brunt of corporate activities.

Tallies for this resolution are still pending.

So what does all this mean for the common investor? According to Gualinga, people should not invest in companies that are present in the Amazon where indigenous people exist because their lives are being affected. He suggests rather than investing in oil companies, invest in protecting the Amazon by supporting indigenous communities who need education.

Leila Salazar Lopez, campaign organizer for Amazon Watch, feels that shareholder resolutions are not the only way to affect corporate policy. Although, she says, if you do have investments in a company, you can use that one share in support of socially responsible resolutions such as the environment or indigenous rights.

To help protect the Amazon, Amazon Watch recommends the following:

• Urge the U.S. Government to end subsidies for fossil fuel projects in ecologically sensitive rainforests;
• Learn more about the struggles of indigenous peoples in the Amazon Basin;
• Reduce your energy consumption and other natural resources that are derived from rainforests;
• Promote and demand renewable energy alternatives;
• Use less paper and wood products, use paper made fro alternative fibers such as agricultural waste, kenaf, hemp or 100 percent recycled paper;
• Don’t buy products that are derived from primary or old growth forests.