COP28: Under Lula, Brazil calls for commitment to forests – 12/08/2023 – Environment

Brazil is trying to implement at COP28, the UN conference on climate change, the decision to eliminate illegal deforestation in the world by 2030. The goal already forms part of Brazil’s commitment to the Paris Agreement, but Itamaraty maintained a historical position against international interventions on climate change. conservation of the territory.

The proposal is included in the draft text under negotiation, released this Friday (8) by the presidency of COP28, which takes place in Dubai until the 12th. There are three text options for the compromise.

The first places 2030 as the deadline to combat and reverse deforestation, also citing the need for alignment with the new global biodiversity framework, approved by countries at the end of last year in a process parallel to climate negotiations, the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. .

The second option goes straight to the point of financial resources, emphasizing their importance for implementing measures such as combating deforestation, while the third language proposed by the countries is even more generic and is limited to “calling on the international community to support the restoration of ecosystems.”

The diversity of alternatives reflects the lack of consensus around the topic. According to observers of the negotiations, Brazil has encountered resistance to the proposal among its Amazonian neighbors and other countries with large forests, which, like Brazil in the past, resist adhering to a commitment that will generate international demands on the management of the national territory.

In August, in Belém, when conducting the Amazon Summit, Brazil tested the proposal with forestry countries, but was unsuccessful and the two commitments signed during the event — one with the Amazon neighbors and the other with the forestry giants of the Congo , the Republic of Congo and Indonesia— avoided committing to zero deforestation, citing more vaguely the commitment to combating deforestation and conserving ecosystems.

A Sheet found that the change in position is due to the new situation created by the Lula (PT) government, which changed the climate scenario for the country.

Historically, Itamaraty had argued at environmental conferences that an international determination on the management of territories would harm national sovereignty. The conservation of natural ecosystems, therefore, should be decided by each country.

At climate conferences, Brazilian diplomacy was comfortable pointing out the energy sector as the main cause of the climate crisis, since, unlike most of the world, Brazil has a highly renewable energy matrix and little dependence on fossil fuels.

Itamaraty has repeated over the last 30 years that the climate problem is energy, not forests. Under Lula, the game changed.

Lula started to use the motto of zero deforestation at home and abroad, as a way of gaining support since the electoral campaign, marking opposition to the previous government, of Jair Bolsonaro (PL), precisely on one of the issues that cost him the most due to international scandals.

The commitment also sought to react to the European Union’s movements, in a context of negotiating the EU-Mercosur trade agreement, legislation against importing deforestation and also the carbon tax at the border. The message that Lula tried to send to rich countries is that they would not need to resort to harsher measures, as Brazil would already guarantee the conservation of the Amazon, the largest tropical forest in the world.

On the other hand, Lula’s Brazil started to focus on opening new sources of oil exploration, such as Foz do Amazonas, creating a new front of dispute with environmentalists and scientists inside and outside the country.

Although it is not yet part of the problem, as it does not depend on fossil fuels, Brazil proposes in the COP28 negotiations that the abandonment of the fossil matrix be initiated by developed countries, so that developing countries can rely on fossil sources for a longer period. .

The differentiated calendar is synergistic with the current government’s plans to expand oil exploration, so that the country is among the last in line to abandon fossil sources — although it is already one of the first in line for renewables.

_{Reporter Ana Carolina Amaral traveled at the invitation of Avaaz, Instituto Arapyaú and Internews.}