In last October’s Brazilian election, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva defeated Jair Bolsonaro by a margin of 1.8%. That narrowest of victories may have been the single most important environmental development of 2022. With Mr Bolsonaro in power, the Amazon rainforest was hurtling towards a tipping point after which it would no longer function as a climate stabiliser and the world’s biggest carbon sink. Between August 2021 and July 2022, an area of forest the size of Qatar was cleared in the interests of big business.
Lula’s government has stopped the rot. Companies involved in illegal deforestation have been sanctioned, armed interventions have taken place to end illegal mining operations, and new conservation areas have been established. Deforestation dropped by 42% during Lula’s first seven months in office, and the state has returned as a protective presence in the Brazilian Amazon. The transformed political context was the catalyst for this week’s landmark regional summit in Belém, in which the eight Latin American nations sharing the Amazon came together – for the first time in 14 years – to produce a plan for its sustainable development.
The outcome was only a partial success. Tuesday’s Belém declaration outlines important new areas of cooperation in combating illegal logging, mining and burning in the Amazon. But it failed to formalise a target of ending deforestation by 2030 – a commitment already adopted by Lula’s Brazil, and one credited with driving much of the progress his government has made this year. Leaders were also unable to agree a common position on the future of industries such as cattle farming, mining and oil, which are driving the destruction. This was, then, a weaker document than environmental groups, and Lula himself, had hoped for. But as it rightly argues, game-changing progress in these areas will not be achieved without assistance – on a transformative scale – from the richer nations that have benefited from exploitation of the Amazon’s resources. If less well-off countries facing huge financial challenges are to rethink the Amazon’s economy, and protect its biodiversity, such stewardship in the global interest will need to be properly rewarded.
Debt relief in exchange for climate action, as called for at the summit, would be a step in the right direction, and should be on the table at this year’s Cop28 summit in Dubai. The subsidising of environmentally viable Amazon products should be stepped up, and China and the United States should follow the European Union’s lead in blocking products linked to deforestation. The indigenous peoples who have been the most effective stewards of the land need to be better protected and empowered. The rainforest’s future will only be truly safeguarded when its economics reward sustainable practice rather than the relentless production of beef in particular, the chief driver of land clearance. It is the responsibility of the world’s most developed nations, as well as the signatories of the Belém declaration, to ensure that happens.
Opening this week’s summit, Lula envisioned a future Amazon “with greener cities, with cleaner air, with mercury-free rivers and forests that are left standing”. By changing the political weather, the Brazilian president’s election has opened a window of opportunity for the most valuable piece of green infrastructure on the planet. The world cannot afford for that opportunity to be missed. But the heavy lifting now required needs to be shared equitably.
