Wyre Davies – BBC News, 06/20/2016
Brazil’s indigenous tribes are as diverse as they are numerous: from the south-western sate of Mato Grosso do Sul to the impenetrable northern jungles of the Amazon to the eastern Atlantic seaboard.
There’s one thing, perhaps above all others, these tribes have in common – the relentless, insatiable pressure on their land and resources.
Indeed, there is nowhere else on earth as dangerous for “defenders” of land or the environment as Brazil.
Dom Phillips and Nick Miroff – The Washington Post, 05/22/2016
Signs of a rightward turn by Brazil’s new government have alarmed conservationists and climate change activists who fear a rollback of environmental laws that could accelerate deforestation in the Amazon basin.
With Brazil’s economy in its worst slump since the 1930s, new leader Michel Temer took power this month promising a more business-friendly agenda to spur growth. Temer named a conservative-leaning cabinet whose members include figures with close ties to powerful landowners and agribusiness companies.
Temer has taken control in South America’s largest nation — and the world’s biggest rain forest — at a time when Brazilian lawmakers are considering a major overhaul of environmental laws. This includes a controversial constitutional amendment known as PEC 65 that would reduce licensing requirements for development projects and limit judicial oversight of their impact.
The Brazil Institute, 04/22/2016
BBC News, 11/26/2014
Brazil said deforestation in the Amazon rainforest has dropped by 18% in the past year. Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira said the fall, for the year ending July 2014, meant deforestation was at its second lowest level in 25 years.
But campaigners say alternative monitoring shows an increase for a second year running.
In 2012 the government eased restrictions on landowners, weakening legal protection for the rainforest. Ms Teixeira said 4,848 square kilometres (1,872 square miles) of rainforest were destroyed between August 2013 and July 2014. The figure was down from 5,891 kilometres (2,275 square miles) during the same period a year earlier.
David Sim – International Business Times, 11/24/2014
Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon is on the increase for the first time in ten years. Deforestation rose last year by 16%, as current policies appear to be failing to deter forest destruction caused mainly by illegal logging and cattle expansion.
Brazil had success in the last decade combating deforestation, consequently cutting carbon emissions. But the country’s annual greenhouse gas emissions were almost 8% higher in 2013 than one year earlier. The Observatorio do Clima, or Climate Observatory, said in a report that greenhouse gas emissions amounted to 1.57 billion metric tons in 2013 compared to 1.45 billion metric tons in 2012.
The increase was a reversal in a trend of declining levels that started in 2005 as emissions of greenhouse gases dropped year by year as deforestation fell. However, compared to a peak of 2.86 billion tonnes of CO2 emitted in 2004, the 2013 number is still 45% smaller.
Anastasia Moloney – The Guardian, 10/20/2014
Farmers with smallholdings are not responsible for most of the destruction of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, but their contribution to deforestation is rising and must be addressed if the country is to hold on to recent gains, according to an environmental research group.
Government efforts led to a 77% fall in deforestation in the Amazon between 2004 and 2011, but progress has slowed and deforestation is rising, the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) said in a report.
The report said that between 2004 and 2011, landowners with more than 500 hectares (1,235 acres) of property were responsible for about 48% of the deforestation. Areas owned by smallholders accounted for 12% of the forests destroyed during the same period. However, since 2005, the contribution to annual deforestation by the largest landowners has fallen by 63%, while that of smallholders has increased by 69%, the report said.
Associated Press – ABC News, 09/23/2014
Despite its critical role in protecting the Amazon rainforest, Brazil will not endorse a global anti-deforestation initiative being announced at the U.N. climate summit, complaining it was left out of the consultation process. A U.N. official disputed that claim.
Brazilian Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira said Brazil was “not invited to be engaged in the preparation process” of the declaration. Instead, she said Brazil was given a copy of the text and asked to endorse it without being allowed to suggest any changes.
“Unfortunately, we were not consulted. But I think that it’s impossible to think that you can have a global forest initiative without Brazil on board. It doesn’t make sense,” Teixeira said in an interview Monday with The Associated Press.
