BOGOTA - Some 3,000 peasant farming families in the northern Colombian department of Bolívar this month completed two years in the governmental program Guardabosques, eradicating illegal drug crops in the areas where they work.

Pedro Moreno, one of the beneficiaries of the project centered in the municipalities of San Pablo and Cantagallo, in the southern part of the department, told Tierramérica that community funds have also been created to finance productive enterprises that ensure sustainability once the program is finalized.

The University of La Paz, coordinator of the program and of the technical training involved, reports that the efforts of these families have led to the recovery of 76,524 hectares of forest, which had been cut down for the cultivation of the drug crops, mostly coca for the production of cocaine.

RIO DE JANEIRO - In the short term, the project to build a gas pipeline more than 8,000 km long, from Venezuela through Brazil and ending in Buenos Aires and Montevideo, is financially nonviable, Giuseppe Bacoccoli, of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, told Tierramérica.

However, Bacoccoli said it would be made reality in a distant future, when South America would have an extensive network of national pipelines, similar to those in Europe and North America.

According to the newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo, the natural gas pipeline is an initiative of Brazil's government-run Petrobrás oil company, which refused to comment on details but admitted that it is considering the idea.

This energy integration project is somewhat like the South American "energy ring" proposed by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez at the Mercosur (Southern Common Market) summit held in Asunción, Paraguay, in July.

GUATEMALA CITY - A group of Guatemalan archeologists discovered somewhat by luck a Maya monument that dates to the year 677, in the northern department of Petén.

The monument has 140 hieroglyphs about the way life was in that era, Guatemala's minister of culture, Manuel Salazar, told Tierramérica.

The content of those writings "is quite interesting, because it tells us about the life of a leader and about the alliance between two towns," said archeologist Edgar Escobedo.

The discovery was made during an expedition whose mission was to confirm reports of looting from another archeological site in Petén, 600 km north of the national capital, said Escobedo, director of the project.

BUENOS AIRES - Environmental organizations in Argentina will draft a manual of best practices for how civil society can play a role in the pacts agreed at international summits, Cecilia Iglesias, president of the Environmental Network Civil Association, told Tierramérica.

The idea for the manual emerged out of the dissatisfaction generated by the deliberations process in the lead up to the IV Summit of the Americas, to take place Nov. 4-5 in the Argentine city of Mar del Plata.

"We want to point out the weaknesses in the process so that participation makes sense. And not only in terms of the environment, but in all areas where civil society is active," explained Iglesias, who is also a member of the environment and sustainable development commission of the Argentine Civil Society Consultative Council.