Photo by: AFP Files
It is too late to being ruminating into the consequences of Climate Change. For years scientists and institutions have been publishing worrying reports and pushing society and big corporations to realize the problem that has been in the making for decades. Deforestation leading to a lack of trees that absorb the carbon dioxide emitted from factories. Ocean solution resulting from oils spills, fishing nets, plastics, which not only affect marine life but also prevent the ocean from absorbing carbon dioxide, given that it is the world’s largest and most effective CO2 reserve. Rising temperatures, rising oceans, drowning cities, displaced people—It is too late to begin learning about this. It is time to act. However, governments and corporations seldom listen until it affects their income, and because of this, countries like Brazil have been ravaging their natural resources to continue building their economic empire, despite the fatal consequences it brings.
Brazil is a world leader in terms of renewable energy. As of 2018, 65% of the country’s electricity came from hydro-powered sources while 15% came from wind, solar, and biomass power. These statistics make Brazil one of the cleanest in terms of electricity portfolio. However, being South America’s largest country, they were also the source of the majority of solution. For example, Brazil is responsible for around 50% of Latin America’s car sales, it is also the second-largest producer of biofuels, and has the most significant flex-fuel industry in the world. Brazil was on the right track to fighting against climate change, but recently, the rates of deforestation have diminished the importance and impact of their other endeavors as it has become the largest threat for Brazil’s carbon emissions, and consequently, the worlds’.
Since the beginning of Bolsonaro’s presidency, he has advocated for Brazil’s further industrialization, claiming this to be a solution to the poverty permeating the nation. With the miraculous Amazon forest as a backyard, Bolsonaro had direct access to land and resources that could help him achieve this deceiving dream. With a focus on money, land, development, he failed to regard native people, wildlife, habitat preservation, and the frightening consequences of deforestation. Starting in 2018 when Jair Bolsonaro withdrew Brazil as a possible host for the climate conferences, the world started fearing that the new Brazilian administration was starting to take steps in the wrong way. Bolsonaro became president on January 1st, 2018, and used his transition into his new position as a justification for refusing to host the conferences. Nevertheless, the world stood back and watched, an uneasy feeling exhuming from the administration but no concrete actions to prove Bolsonaro’s negligence towards the climate. Throughout his campaign and later appointment as president, Bolsonaro has made it clear that the climate is not one of his main concerns, rather, it is a road block. He is a populist president, and by nature he puts economy and profit before anything else. Because of this, in various ocasions he said that the climate protection movement was a burden on the economy, later threatening to leave the Paris Climate Accords. Brazil never took action on this threat, and they remain a part of the Paris Agreement, but it is safe to say that the government is talking a lot and doing very little. One of Bolsonaro’s main promises was to remove certain restrictions and legislations protecting the Amazon rainforest so that agriculturalists, or ruralistas, could enter the forest with bulldozers and fires as destructive weapons aiming to dismantle the ecosystem. To further show his priorities, Bolsonaro appointed Ricardo Salles as his environment minister. Salles is former legal director of the Brazilian Rural Society, an agricultural group that profits over large sections of land and significant industrial farms. In 2018, he was fined for ignoring environmentally protected regions in the Amazon so that the São Paulo state could conduct business there. It is important to note that at the time, he was the head of said agency that would benefit from the destruction of that set of land. In addition to the precarious environmental minister position, Bolsonaro has also warded the foreign minister job to a man who has discredited climate change as a plot by “cultural Marxists”. Enresto Araujo claims that climate change is a political tool used by the left, and has made clear his stance and plans for his time in the Bolsonaro administration. Amongst the land that Bolsonaro promised to deregulate are villages and towns belonging to native peoples. He claimed that the indigenous groups already had too much land, and that parts of it could go towards mining and agriculture. As of 2019 the deforestation in Brazil has increased 88.4% while the Brazilian space agency identified over 2,072 square miles of deforested land. Many environmentalist groups have attempted to fight against the administration’s war on the Amazon rainforest, but doing so has become harder and harder as Bolsonaro has cut down environment budgets and imposed legislations that restrict their freedom to work in the forest. In 2020, Brazilians space agency, Inpe announced that the deforestation levels in the country had grown to a 12-year high as 11,088 square kilometers of forests were destroyed from 2019 to 2020, increasing 9.5% from 2018 numbers. Although Bolsonaro declared a goal of slowing down deforestation to an average of 3,900 square kilometers per year, he continued to defund state groups that arrested illegal loggers and farmers in an attempt to prioritize the economy. Environmentalists worry about the increasing rates of deforestation, as Climate Observatory, a Brazilian NGO says “The PRODES figures show that Bolsonaro’s plan worked. They reflect the result of a successful initiative to annihilate the capacity of the Brazilian State and the inspection bodies to take care of our forests and fight crime in the Amazon.” The situation becomes more convoluted as Joe Biden, the United States’ president, and Bolsonaro have begun negotiations regarding deforestation in the Amazon. Bolsonaro approached the Biden administration asking them to provide $1 billion dollars in aid, promising that they would reduce deforestation by 40%. Biden was extremely close to signing the agreement as he recently announced a very ambitious plan to combat Climate change, saying that the United States would decrease its 2005 emissions by half by 2030. Nevertheless, activists and indigenous groups have approached Biden, asking him not to engage in the transaction given that Brazil already has the funds to decrease their deforestation, the Bolsonaro administration simply prioritizes the economy over the climate. The Guardian summarized the issue with the proposal by saying, “Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon is not the result of a lack of money, but a consequence of the government’s deliberate failure of care.” Since Brazil approached the United States with the proposal, over 200 Brazilian groups have contributed to a letter to the United States saying that providing Brazil with these funds would only legitimize a government that does not prioritize climate change while also saying that "the Bolsonaro government was an ‘enemy’ of the Amazon and that it did not have legitimacy to represent Brazil.” Bolsonaro and his administration dismiss the claims and continue advocating for their plan to reach zero carbon emissions by 2050, which, according to the BBC, is 10 years than they had previously claimed. Nevertheless, these numbers are hard to believe given the government’s attitude towards climate change. From lack of regulations, promoting mining and agricultural industries in protected areas, denying the impact of amazonian forest fires, the Brazilian government has continuously proved their lack of credibility regarding their Climate Change goals while also showing politicians’ disregard towards the growing crisis.
Written by: Carolina Mejia Rodriguez
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