Bolsonaro Dismisses Amazon Deforestation as ‘Cultural’
Olivia Rosane Nov. 22, 2019 08:26AM
Despite
confirmation this week that the deforestation rate in the Amazon rainforest is
at its highest in more than a decade, far-right Brazilian President Jair
Bolsonaro refuses to take the problem seriously.
When
confronted with findings from Brazil's National Institute for Space Research
(INPE) that deforestation between August 2018 and July 2019 was at its highest
rate since 2008, Bolsonaro wrote them off as inevitable.
"Deforestation
and fires will never end," Bolsonaro told reporters in Brasilia Wednesday,
according to The Washington Post. "It's cultural."
Former INPE
researcher and member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences Carlos Nobre told
Folha De S. Paulo that there had been a persistent culture of deforestation in
Brazil since the arrival of the Portuguese. He noted that during the military
dictatorship that governed Brazil from the 1960s to the 1980s, land donated by the
government was cleared in order to obtain agricultural loans from the Bank of
Brazil.
But
cultural doesn't mean unchangeable. The Washington Post noted that a high
deforestation rate in the 1990s declined when Brazil's environmental agency
IBAMA began to actively fight illegal mining and logging in the forest.
Bolsonaro, however, campaigned on a promise to open the Amazon to development,
and critics say he has weakened enforcement. Despite a year marked by
environmental catastrophes including record fires in the Amazon and a
devastating oil spill, IBAMA handed out its lowest number of fines since 2000
from January to September of Bolsonaro's first year in office.
"About
90 percent of the destruction of the forest occurs illegally," Marcio
Astrini, public policy coordinator at Greenpeace Brazil, told The Washington
Post. "Therefore, the only cultural aspect of deforestation in the Amazon
is the culture of forest crime, which the government does not seem to want to
confront."
Bolsonaro's
remarks also ignore other cultures in Brazil that rely on the forest for their
way of life: the region's indigenous communities that are also threatened by
Bolsonaro's pro-development rhetoric. Indigenous forest guardian Paulo Paulino
Guajajara was murdered by illegal loggers earlier this month, and advocates say
the blame ultimately lies with Bolsonaro's promises to open indigenous reserves
to industry.
"President
Bolsonaro wants to destroy the indigenous peoples of Brazil. His racism and
hate encourage miners and loggers to invade our territories and kill our
people. Well, I've got news for him – we love our lands much more than he hates
us, and we will never allow him to destroy us, or the forests we have protected
for so long," Sonia Guajajara, the Executive Coordinator of the
Association of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB), said at a protest this
month reported by Survival International.
Bolsonaro's
remarks contradict other members of his government, who have pledged to tackle
deforestation following the release of the latest INPE figures.
Environment
Minister Ricardo Salles promised to fight illegal forest clearing, and
Institutional Security Minister General Augusto Heleno Pereira echoed that
commitment during an interview in Brasilia, Bloomberg News reported Thursday.
"We
are already preparing a stronger policy to contain fires," Heleno said. "Everybody
is convinced we must tighten enforcement."
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