In 2014, FAO released a manifesto entitled “We cannot live without forests” [I]. Its first paragraph reiterates what we all know: “Forests are essential for sustaining life on the planet (...) and are home to 80% of terrestrial biodiversity”. On August 22nd, Michel Temer took another step towards making life on Earth unfeasible, by decreeing the National Copper Reserve and its Associates (Renca) in the Amazon, with an area of 46.450 km², larger than that of the state of Rio de Janeiro [II]. Located on the border between Pará and Amapá, the region encompasses the Montanhas do Tumucumaque National Park, the largest tropical forest park in the world, as well as other forests, four ecological reserves and two indigenous reserves, one of which belongs to the Wajãpi community, only contacted in 1973. In March, in Toronto, Fernando Coelho Filho, Minister of Mines and Energy, had announced to Canadian mining companies the end of Renca as a mineral reserve at an event entitled Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC). Today, approximately 30 Canadian companies already explore minerals in Brazilian territory, especially gold [III]. The decree opens the possibility of licensing for mining projects in the region, considered rich in gold, copper, iron, nickel, manganese and tantalum. [IV], an element used in electronic equipment, quite rare in the Earth's crust (1 to 2 ppm) and expected to be exhausted in the next 50 years. As the director of the National Department of Mineral Production (DNPM), Victor Hugo Froner Bicca, states with simple jingoism, the region is the “last frontier of still considerable geological potential available in the world. It’s a historic day for the sector” [IN]. It is certainly a historic day, as the Temer's decree is a frontal attack on indigenous peoples, on the safety of all Brazilians, on the biosphere and the planetary climate system, on which we existentially depend as a society and as a species [YOU].
The decree is part of the Brazilian Mineral Industry Revitalization Program, launched on July 25, which includes the change of 23 points in the Mining Code, “with the purpose of unlocking and stimulating mining activity”, in the words of the website of the Ministry of Mines and Energy [VII]. Michel Temer and the group that manages him do what was predicted they would do once in power: the final assault on the last socio-environmental safeguards not overturned by Dilma Rousseff. Among them are [VIII]:
(1) the conversion into law (13.465) of provisional measure 759, sanctioned on July 11, 2017, the so-called land grabbing amnesty law made between 2004 and 2011, against which 61 civil society organizations and networks are seeking legal action unconstitutionality [IX];
(2) easing the environmental license and transferring its granting to states and municipalities;
(3) exemption from environmental license for extensive farming and for any rural property “in environmental regularization” (invaded or stolen land, as a rule registered as “property in regularization”);
(4) presidential signature of Ordinance from the Attorney General's Office (ADI 3239 [X]), extending the validity of the “time frame” thesis to indigenous lands. By this thesis, all lands from which Indians were expelled before the promulgation of the Constitution in October 1988 (including in cases of “reluctant expropriation”) are no longer recognized as indigenous lands, such as, for example, the Guaranis of Mato Grosso do Sul and now those of the Pico do Jaraguá reserve in São Paulo [XIV];
(5) bill, being processed under an emergency regime (PL no. 8.107/2017), which hands over 350 thousand hectares or 26,5% of the National Forest (Flona) of Jamanxim, in SW Pará, in a municipality ironically called Novo Progresso, where a trailer with ten vehicles destined for Ibama inspection was set on fire in the middle of BR163 at the behest of deforesters. The new status of this forest (APA) will allow agricultural, mining, urban and rural occupation activities [XII].
Society's reaction to this scorched earth policy is beginning to take shape, as shown by an Avaaz petition that already has many thousands of signatures and whose membership is advancing at a rapid pace. For those who haven't signed it yet, here's the link: https://secure.avaaz.org/po/nao_ao_deserto_amazonico/?zihIulb
Furthermore, several NGOs and the indigenous peoples of Pará and Amapá are expected to take legal action against Temer's decree. It is also worth mentioning a reaction from the Senator of Amapá, Randolfe Rodrigues (Rede-AP), who presented a Legislative Decree Project (SF) no. 160/2017, co-signed by other senators [XIII], with the aim of stopping Temer’s decree.
A placid consensus
But the chances of its approval are slim. Diminished, because, it must be admitted, beneath the antagonisms that roil the surface of the Brazilian partisan spectrum, there is a placid consensus: nature is still perceived as a subsystem of the economy. Forests, for example, are a potential commodity or an obstacle to access to soil and subsoil, that is, to other commodities. The immediate corollary of this subordination of ecology to the economy is that forests, that is, the people, flora and fauna that inhabit and conserve them, are an externality and even an obstacle to the process of producing goods. With the exception of Luiza Erundina's PSOL, for whom “the models we defended have been exhausted” [XIV], and perhaps some isolated personalities from REDE, all Brazilian parties share this conception of the world. There are, of course, those who advocate ways of converting the forest into a commodity in a “sustainable” way, that is, without destroying it beyond its supposed capacity for regeneration. But illusion, ignorance and bad faith come together here because, as a result of the rapid worsening of climate change, droughts, fires and the extermination of biodiversity, the resilience threshold of forests is getting closer and closer, as suggested, more once, an experiment carried out on trees belonging to 115 generates in the Amazon rainforest [XIV]. Other experiments with similar results show that this perception of an imminent danger of dieback of tropical forests is today mainstream science. No one can say anymore, respecting the precautionary principle, what is the “sustainable” limit of wood extraction in the Amazon, hence the importance of Greenpeace’s “Zero Deforestation” campaign.
Proof of this tacit partisan consensus is the fact that the leaders of the PT and PCdoB share with the PMDB, the PSDB and the so-called “Centrão” responsibility for the extermination of the biosphere in the country. Aldo Rebelo, when leader of the PCdoB, was the rapporteur of the project for the new Forest Code (Law 12.651/2012), after whose implementation in 2012 deforestation in the Amazon increased by 75%. Rebelo hired Samanta Pineda, legal consultant for environmental issues at the Agricultural Parliamentary Front, to format his proposal [XVI]. Grateful, the agribusiness and paper and cellulose business groups donated R $ million 6,5 to his electoral campaign and those of other deputies members of the special Forest Code commission, according to the statements available in the website of the Superior Electoral Court [XVII].
The PT leadership's alliances with the “modern” large estates (three-time world champion in pesticides, state-of-the-art machinery in the art of devastation and work similar to slavery) form a long dossier of betrayals of its voters. Your recent support for Kátia Abreu's candidacy [XVIII] to the government of Tocantins in 2018 abolishes the last nuances that still differentiated its action from the socio-environmental predation of the Agricultural Parliamentary Front (FPA). The PT has become, in fact, an auxiliary force for the 240 deputies of the FPA, the largest group in the Brazilian Congress, whose agenda is cohesive and well defined: the removal of environmental protection legislation, the assault on indigenous and quilombola reserves, the regression of rural workers' rights and the deregulation of the land market. If the social forces that still support the PT leadership do not give enough, the acronym will definitively mean Party of Landlords. The destruction of the Amazon and the Cerrado between 2001 and 2014, as shown by the areas in red in figure 1, provides a reliable and brutal portrait of the legacy of the PT and PCdoB leadership to the workers.
More than 50% of the Cerrado's primary coverage, which originally extended over around 23% of the national territory (2 million km2), has been lost to agriculture and livestock in the last 50 years. Between 1994 and 2008, the Cerrado lost an average of 15.700 km2 per year. In 2005, Lula created a National Cerrado Commission that remained a dead letter. The National Climate Change Policy established by him in 2009 (Law No. 12.187) set a target by 2020 of reducing this average annual loss by 40%. This target is absurd because it means considering it acceptable to lose 1% per year of its remaining vegetation, that is, almost 10 thousand km2. Dilma Rousseff, then Minister of the Civil House, had vetoed the initial proposal for a 50% reduction. Between 2013 and 2015, no less than 30 thousand km2 of native vegetation were completely removed [XX]. According to a prospective study by Bernardo Strassburg and colleagues, from 2017, “if current trends continue, 31% to 34% of the remaining area of Cerrado vegetation cover should be suppressed by 2050 (...), leading to the extinction of ~480 species of endemic plants – three times more than all documented extinctions since 1500” [XX]. In June 2015, Brazil made an international commitment to restore 12 million hectares of native vegetation cover by 2030. The text of this commitment (INDC) does not even mention any objective of preserving the Cerrado. As Mercedes Bustamante ironizes, “Given the advance of deforestation, it will soon really become unnecessary to mention it” [XXI].
Brazil's water tank
The image and data contained in figure 2 allow us to understand why the Cerrado is called the cradle and great distributor of water resources for a large part of the national territory.
Therefore, those who think that the destruction of the Cerrado will not have catastrophic consequences for the country are mistaken. In this biome there are three large aquifers (Guarani, Bambuí and Urucuia) and three large river basins are born in it (Tocantins-Araguaia, Paraná-Prata and São Francisco), on which we crucially depend, and no less than thousands of other species. As Tiago Reis recalls, from Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), “the loss of native vegetation in the Cerrado compromises the formation of rain through evapotranspiration and the infiltration of water into the soil to recharge aquifers and rivers in the region” [XXII]. Added to this is the pollution of aquifers by pesticides and a growing demand for intensive irrigation agriculture, typical of agribusiness that exports water in the form of soybeans, beef and other products, which has led to completely unsustainable water withdrawals. One of the first consequences, but certainly not the last, of the destruction of the Cerrado is water rationing in the Federal District, imposed since the end of 2016 and with no end date.
[I] See FAO, We can't live without forests. "Forests are key to supporting life on Earth.” (networked).
[II] See Decree No. 9.142, of 22/VIII/2017: Extinguishes the National Copper Reserve and its associates, constituted by Decree No. 89.404, of February 24, 1984, located in the States of Pará and Amapá. Official Gazette (online).
[III] Cf. Ricardo Senra, “Canadian mining companies learned about the extinction of the reserve in the Amazon 5 months before the official announcement”. BBC Brasil 26/VIII/2017.
[IV] See Jonathan Watts, “Brazil abolishes huge Amazon reserve in 'biggest attack' in 50 years”. The Guardian, 24/VIII/2017.
[IN] Quoted by Helena Martins, “Government extinguishes National Copper Reserve and Associates”. Agency Brazil, 23/2017/XNUMX.
[YOU] See Marina Rossi, “Temer Government calls on mining companies to go on a new hunt for gold in the Amazon”. El País, 25/VIII/2017; Philippe Watanabe, Fernando Tadeu Moraes, “Temer extinguishes reserve in the Amazon to expand mineral exploration”. Folha de São Paulo, 23/VIII/2017; Bernardo de Mello Franco, “Attack on the Amazon”. Folha de São Paulo, 24/2017/XNUMX.
[VII] Cf. “Federal Government announces Brazilian Mineral Industry Revitalization Program”. Ministry of Mines and Energy, 25/VII/2017 (online).
[VIII] For an analysis of these measures, see the articles by Claudio Angelo and Luciana Vicária, “Without an agreement, environmental licensing must be voted on tomorrow”. Observatório do Clima (Climate Observatory), 23/VIII/2017 and Claudio Angelo, “Why you can’t celebrate the drop in deforestation”. Observatório do Clima (Climate Observatory), 24/2017/XNUMX.
[IX] See Carlos Rittl, “The price of the tractor”, Economic value, 21/VIII/2017; Moacir Rodrigues, “Entities call for action against the “Law of Land Grabbing”. crop, 31/VII/2017.
[X] This is Direct Unconstitutionality Action No. 3239 proposed by the DEM, questioning the rights of quilombolas, recognized by Decree No. 4.887/2003. See “ADI 3239 – Quilombola Communities”, Conectas - Human Rights (networked).
[XIV] This 512 hectare reserve was revoked by the Ministry of Justice on August 21st. See Felipe Mascari, “Revocation of the Pico do Jaraguá indigenous reserve will be the end of the community”. Current Brazil Network, 22/VIII/2017.
[XII] See Fábio Maisonnave, “After vetoing the measure, Temer proposes new forest cutting in PA”. Folha de São Paulo, 14/VII/2017.
[XIII] Jorge Viana, João Capiberibe, Cristovão Buarque, Vanessa Grazziotin, Otto Alencar and Lindbergh Farias
[XIV] In an interview with CartaCapital (19/V/2016), Erundina stated: “We even need to review our relationship with nature, it is no longer possible to maintain a predatory development model”.
[XV] See Adriane Esquivel-Muelbert et al., “Biogeographical distributions of neotropical trees reflect their directly measured drought tolerances”. Scientific Reports, 7, 21/VIII/2017; Vandré Fonseca, “The drier, the worse”. ((o)) echo, 21/2017/XNUMX.
[XVI] See Marta Salomon, “Agribusiness consultant helped prepare the Forest Code report.” State of Sao Paulo, 8/VI/2010.
[XVII] “Deputies in favor of changes to the Forest Code received donations from deforesters.” Viomundo, 4/IV/2011.
[XVIII] See “In a meeting, PT decides to support Kátia Abreu in the elections for the government of Tocantins”. North of Tocantins, 21/VIII/2017. There is profuse information about Kátia Abreu's links with deforestation, land grabbing, the invasion of indigenous lands and work similar to slavery. See, for example, Marcio Zontas, “The faces of Kátia Abreu”. Brazil indeed, 13/IV/2013 and “Senator Kátia Abreu. PMDB/Tocantins”. Republic of Ruralists.
[XX] Cf. “Deforestation in the Cerrado exceeds that in the Amazon, indicates official data”. Observatório do Clima (Climate Observatory), 25/VII/2017.
[XX] See Bernardo BN Strassburg et al., “Moment of truth for the Cerrado hotspot”. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 23/III/2017.
[XXI] See Mercedes Bustamante, “Climate policy neglects the Cerrado – once again”. Observatório do Clima (Climate Observatory), 23/XI/2015.
[XXII] Quoted in “Deforestation in the Cerrado exceeds that in the Amazon, indicates official data”. Observatório do Clima (Climate Observatory), 25/VII/2017.
