Datafolha: 73% are against mining on indigenous land – 04/07/2023 – Environment

The majority of the Brazilian population rejects mining on indigenous lands and believes that the activity is primarily responsible for the deaths of people in Yanomami territory.

Still, three out of four Brazilians agree that the courts should punish businessmen who profit from illegal gold and release prospectors.

On the other hand, 79% think that indigenous people should develop economic activities in order not to depend on government resources.

This is what a recent survey by Datafolha points out about the first three months of the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT. The survey heard 2,028 people from 126 municipalities over 16 years of age on March 29 and 30 of this year. error is two percentage points.

The opinion against mining activity on indigenous lands had already been the majority —in greater numbers—in a previous Datafolha survey on the subject. In 2019, 86% of Brazilians rejected the mining permit in the territories, against the 73% who disagreed with the statement now. 24% are in favor, 2% do not know and 1% neither agree nor disagree.

Among the 75% who think that Justice should punish businessmen who profit from mining and release prospectors, 57% completely agree.

Disagreements are more noticeable among businessmen: 36% think that the government should allow mining activity on indigenous lands —12 percentage points more than the total population. About mining being the main cause of indigenous deaths, they distance themselves from the total, and only 49% agree with the statement (in general, 70% agree).

The opinions of those who prefer the PL, the party of former president Jair Bolsonaro, and those who voted for him in the second round of the presidential elections are noteworthy. 65% of the first group disagree with the statement “the government should allow mining on indigenous lands”, a number that rises to 71% in the second.

This is because stimulating activity was one of the main flags of the Bolsonaro government. It was the former president’s management that gave unprecedented approval to two mines for prospecting in an area close to the Yanomami TI, in Roraima, last year.

At the beginning of the year, the Lula government declared a state of health emergency in Yanomami territory. With the advance of mining, according to reports by associations of indigenous peoples, there was an explosion of malnutrition and malaria in the region.

For Márcio Santilli, founding partner of Instituto Socioambiental, the disagreement between the public that prefers the PL and voted for Bolsonaro indicates that the issue of mining does not define voting.

“People identify with Bolsonaro because of another issue that they consider central, because mining is a remote thing, since most people don’t live in these regions”, says Santilli. “Just like we have people who are in favor of mining and vote for Lula.”

Regarding the punishment of businessmen and the release of miners, he says that there may be a general sense of justice. “It’s something that can be naturalized by people because of unemployment: they put the blame not on the person, but on a social situation that would make that person have no choice.”

The opinion on mining as a cause of death among indigenous people, however, is the one that most divides PT and PL supporters and those who voted for Lula or Bolsonaro. But the majority prevails: 57% of those who prefer the PL agree with the statement, and the number rises to 60% among those who declared their vote in the second round for the former president.

Among petistas, the number is 79%, one percentage point more than those who voted for Lula.

Support for the idea of ​​activities for indigenous people to generate income is more frequent among people over 60 years of age. 87% agree with the statement, and 64% strongly agree, against 55% of the total average. Santilli states that opinions favorable to the affirmation may reveal lack of knowledge about how productions and work work in indigenous communities.

“This question arises a lot for those who see the situation from afar. I don’t think that those who receive money from the government are much more frequent than other groups of the population who also receive these benefits”, he says. “Except in severely destructured places, such as the Yanomami villages, where the economy has been destroyed. They don’t have fish, they don’t have swiddens and malaria all the time, they can’t work in the swiddens”.