“This story that the Amazon is on fire is a lie,” he said during the August 10 second presidency of the Leticia Pact for the preservation of the Amazon. “And we have to combat this with real numbers.”
However, Bolsonaro’s government continues to dismiss concerns that fires in the area are out of control – on Wednesday, Vice President Hamilton Mourao lamented that the protected part of the forest was ‘not burning’, and dismissed US actor Leonardo diCaprio for placing it. about the problem on social media.
“I would like to invite our most recent critic, actor Leonardo DiCaprio, to join me here in São Gabriel da Cachoeira to do an eight-hour march through the jungle between São Gabriel Airport and Cucuí Road. There he will do better understand how things work in this vast region, ”Mourao said during a conference sponsored by the Brazilian Industry Association (CNI).
Delete the Amazon
The Amazon is the largest rainforest in the world and an indispensable resource in the fight against global warming. When the rainforest is healthy, its trees and plants emit billions of tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year, and it is one of the planet’s best defenses against climate change.
Fires are often lit in the Amazon to wipe out vegetation from parts of the forest that have already been pruned – all in preparation for illegal grazing and livestock dyeing. Environmentalists have criticized Bolsonaro’s pronounced support for logging and development in the Amazon as a signal to encourage illegal land reclamation operations.
His government has taken some steps to do so. In mid-July, Bolsonaro signed a decree banning fires for 120 days. Brazil’s Ministry of Defense also launched Green Brazil Operation 2, a military mission aimed at destroying fires.
While fires in the Amazon increased in July, Bolsonaro pointed out in his August 10 address that total deforestation – which includes fires along with other methods of land reclamation – fell 28%, compared to last year’s record-breaking deforestation in the same month.
Nevertheless, the general trend for bad news for the flora and fauna of the Amazon suggests, with INPE data showing that total deforestation in the Amazon has increased sharply in the first half of 2020.
For Greenpeace, the presence of fires proves that the Bolsonaro administration is not doing enough to “enforce environmental protection” on paper.
“In 2020, despite the ban on the use of fire and with the armed forces in the field since mid-May, the fires are still uncontrolled in the Amazon, proving again the inefficiency of the government,” said Cristiane Mazzetti , spokesman for the Greenpeace Amazon campaign.
“The figures show that the strategy adopted by the federal government is inefficient to contain the destruction of the most biodiverse forest on the planet,” Mazzetti said. “Prohibiting fires on paper does not work without efficient command and control operations by the designated agencies.”
The Leticia Pact was formed last September by seven of the nine countries that share the Amazon region – Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil, Guyana and Suriname. It requires working together to address the causes of deforestation, taking initiatives for forest restoration, sustainable use of natural resources, actions to empower women and indigenous peoples, and creating educational campaigns on the importance of that region.
Bolsonaro told last week’s meeting that Brazil had been unfairly criticized. “Our policy is zero tolerance. Not only for the common crime, but also for the environmental problem. Fighting illegal activities is essential to preserving our Amazon rainforest.”
But then he continued to indulge in the kind of activity in the Amazon that conservationists say ultimately signals tolerance for illegal deforestation and burning. “But that’s not all. We also need to develop sustainable development in the region,” he said.
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