Jair Bolsonaro, who is leaving the presidency of Brazil, is not expected at the meeting of heads of state taking place as part of the 27th United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP27) this Sunday (December 6, November. With names confirmed such as Joe Biden, the Leader of the United States, one of the most anticipated presences is that of the next President of Brazil: Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
The winner of the elections against Bolsonaro is still unable to determine the direction of the Brazilian delegation’s negotiations and must attend the meeting organized by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in the second week of negotiations.
“Lula’s presence is a very positive sign, a sign of a country turning to the world after years as a pariah,” comments Izabella Teixeira, former environment minister who will be one of the advisers to the presidency at the climate conference in Egypt.
Speaking to DW, Teixeira said there was a high demand from key delegations to meet with the interim government. The expectation is that discussions will go beyond international cooperation to protect the Amazon.
“Brazil will arrive renewed, guided by its democracy, by its great technical capacity in science, by its youth and by its indigenous peoples. The world is waiting for Brazil,” explains Teixeira.
High emissions and deforestation
Led by current Environment Minister Joaquim Leite, the official delegation sees COP27 as a moment to reaffirm all countries’ commitments to mitigating climate change, particularly the largest emitters, Itamaraty told DW via email.
Brazil is the world’s sixthbiggest emitter of greenhouse gases after China, the United States, India, Indonesia and Russia, according to a World Resources Institute (WRI) platform dedicated to the topic, which is collecting information through 2019.
Since then, the numbers have only gotten worse, according to Stela Herschmann, a climate observatory specialist who follows the negotiations in Egypt. “The year 2021 was the fourth consecutive year with an increase in national emissions, mainly driven by the increase in deforestation, year on year,” he says.
The CO2 pollution that the country releases into the atmosphere every year is calculated in parallel with official bodies by the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Estimate System (SeeG), a project of 77 organizations led by the climate observatory. The latest survey showed that emissions in 2021 reached 2.42 billion gross tonnes of CO2 (tCO2e), the highest level in almost two decades.
Globally reducing carbon emissions is key for the world to reach the goal set out in the Paris Agreement: to limit global warming to 1.5°C by the end of the century compared to the preindustrial era.
“Official Brazil, coming to negotiations with officials from the current Brazilian government, has a climate identity that ranges from flat earth to denial, but concretely leading to high emissions and deforestation,” comments Teixeira.
Omission and Isolation
Immediately after taking office in 2019, Bolsonaro warned that Brazil would not host the COP25 as planned three years earlier. The negative message was picked up and the country’s image on the international stage deteriorated with each edition of the conference.
“The data only showed the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. And at COP26 in Glasgow, the government hid the deforestation data from Prodes,” Herschmann points out, noting that the information is released annually by the National Institute for Space Research (INPE). , Mid November.
Behind the scenes, the Bolsonaro government is said to emphasize the energy issue at meetings and events in the official pavilion. “The news from the energy sector is also bad. Seeg has shown that emissions from this activity are the highest since the 1970s,” emphasizes Hershmann.
At their farewell climate conference, the current government’s international isolation must remain in place, as it has been at previous COPs. “It’s been four years of not just giving up, but of declared fighting against the environmental and climate agenda, against the indigenous peoples, the Amazon region, against the federal agencies that care about the environment,” publicity specialist Carlos Rittl analyzes guidelines of the Rainforest Foundation of Norway.
“As a country, we want to be part of the solution again and not part of the problem, as we have been for the past four years. Civil society has prepared a lot for this transition, we have very concrete proposals to discuss, all based on science,” says Ana. Toni, Executive Director of the Instituto Clima e Sociedade.
With a view to the Brazil of the future
Without dialogue with the Bolsonaro government, civil society grew in number, international dialogue intensified, and gained more and more space at COPs. Since 2019, organizations have been running the Brazil Climate Action Hub, created to provide visibility to climate action in the country.
“Unfortunately, we still arrive in Egypt divided, with one pavilion for the federal government, another for civil society and a third for the governors of the Amazon. The hope is that we can get to the next COP together. Hope and determination to be a fundamental player in the fight against climate change,” says Ana Toni.
At COP27, Rittl believes that Lula must show that he is taking up the policy to reduce deforestation in the Amazon that was abandoned under Bolsonaro and that he is doing more to protect the climate.
“The Amazon Fund was negotiated during Lula’s tenure, as were the National Climate Change Policy goals. However, the resumption of this policy must be adapted to the times of 2023, with the necessary urgency with which we must deal with these issues,” adds Rittl.
Last week, the Brazilian Forum of NGOs and Social Movements for Environment and Development (FBOMS) sent a letter to Lula asking that Brazil be put back at the center of global climate negotiations and that the incoming president signal Brazil’s willingness to to host the climate summit in 2025.
For Izabella Teixeira, it’s time for Brazil to decide what role and position it wants to play in the world. “It’s a country full of contradictions, with a lot of work ahead of us, but it has alternatives and many peculiarities, like the Amazon. We don’t need to copy anyone’s model, we need to know what we’re going to do with the wealth we have in the country,” he said.