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LatinNews Daily - 15 November 2021

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BRAZIL: COP26 commitments already in doubt

On 15 November, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro told investors in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that the Brazilian Amazon remains a practically untouched “paradise” which does not catch fire as it is a “humid forest”

Analysis:

Bolsonaro is on a six-day trip to drum up investment in the Middle East, where he will also visit Bahrain and Qatar. The tone he and his ministers have adopted suggests that the government is trying to project a green and sustainable image, as it had sought to do at the recent United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP26) in Scotland. But Bolsonaro’s denialist discourse on the reality of deforestation, coming on the back of worrying deforestation figures for October, indicate that he has not changed his views on environmental issues and protection, confirming the doubts of those who looked upon Brazil’s COP26 pledges with scepticism

  • Speaking during the launch of the Invest in Brazil forum in Dubai today, Bolsonaro and several of his ministers – including Agriculture Minister Tereza Cristina da Costa Dias and Mines & Energy Minister Bento Albuquerque – bigged up Brazil’s environmental credentials. Bolsonaro also fell back upon a well-worn discourse, that of arguing that Brazil is unfairly represented and criticised over its Amazon policies. 
  • “The attacks Brazil suffers when we speak about the Amazon are not fair…[the forest] is almost exactly the same as when it was discovered in 1500”, Bolsonaro said. Scientists estimate that around 17% of the overall Amazon’s surface has been lost to deforestation. 
  • Three days prior to Bolsonaro’s comments in Dubai, the government’s national space research institute (Inpe) released preliminary deforestation data for October, which show forest loss soaring that month. According to the Inpe’s deforestation alert system (Deter), some 877km2 were deforested in October, a 5% increase on last year and the highest figure for the month in the last six years. 
  • Brazil’s environment minister Joaquim Leite has yet to comment on these latest deforestation figures. When they were released on 12 November, Leite told journalists that he was not aware of the latest data as he was focused on the final COP26 negotiations. 

Looking Ahead: At the COP26, Brazil pledged to end deforestation by 2028 – an unconvincing pledge given the current reality of Amazon destruction and the lack of political will to tackle the situation. 

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