Brazil environmentalists face new battle on Amazon
Copyright 2001 Reuters
August 28, 2001
BRASILIA - Brazilian farmers and environmentalists are gearing up for battle again ahead of a key congressional vote that could ease the limits on how much forest can be cut down in the Amazon jungle.
A special congressional commission will vote on Sept. 4 on a bill environmentalists fear could pave the way for accelerated destruction of the world's largest tropical forest.
The dispute centers on a bill by Moacir Micheletto, a lawmaker from the agricultural lobby in Congress, which calls for the introduction of a "zoning" study of the Amazon to determine how much forest can be cut down in the future.
Most of the Amazon, which is larger than all of Western Europe combined, is in Brazil and it is home to up to 50 percent of the world's animal and plant species.
If approved on Sept. 4, and subsequently by Congress, Micheletto's bill would replace a so-called provisional measure by the government that requires 80 percent of all property in the Amazon to be set aside for protection.
A spokesman for Micheletto said the bill maintains the 80 percent limit but added that it would open the way for a reduction if local studies in the Amazon area recommended such changes.
Environmentalists favor the current provisional measure, which dates back to 1998, and hope it will be made permanent.
They worry that its provisional status leaves it in a "legislative limbo" that could allow Congress to change it or replace it with a permanent law at any time. Provisional measures renew themselves automatically every few months if they are not challenged by Congress.
The Sept. 4 vote on Micheletto's bill will be the second time in six months that the agricultural lobby in Congress has attempted to push through a new law. They failed in May and have changed the bill slightly since then.
Reduced cohesion in the government's ruling coalition ahead of presidential elections next year could give the bill greater chances this time as lawmakers are more likely to vote without following party lines.
Assuero Veronez, an environmental adviser to the National Agriculture Confederation - a group backing the bill, said just 25.6 percent of the Amazon is currently in private hands, while the rest is already protected by nature parks and Indian reserves.
CURRENT LEVEL OF PROTECTION CRITICIZED
"We are not against preserving the Amazon," Veronez said. "This (protection) is a right of Brazilian society, but we consider 80 percent as an exaggerated level of protection."
Environmentalists do not like it. They fear, above all, that the zoning studies envisioned by the bill could be carried out by local governments in the Amazon that do not have the technical know-how to evaluate what segments of the forests are threatened.
"In practice, this implies the possibility of the complete elimination of the obligation of maintaining a legal reserve set aside in the Amazon," said Andre Lima, a lawyer from the Social Environmental Institute.
Environmentalists warned that the bill could also lead to more damage in other threatened ecosystems in Brazil, such as the Mata Atlantic coastal forests, where it stipulates much smaller reserve levels.