Protecting the Amazon Rainforest: Why “zero deforestation” is a utopia

Gold diggers, loggers and ranchers – they all profit from the illegal clearing of the Brazilian Amazon rainforest. President Lula wants a “zero deforestation strategy” – but that will probably remain a utopia.

If you turn west in the Amazon city of Novo Progresso next to advertising signs for chainsaws, gold exchange offices and cabaret dance halls and cross the Jamanxim River on a lumbering wooden bridge at the city limits, you have arrived in Brazil’s Wild West.

After the asphalt road, we continue on a red dirt road. Illegal gold diggers already have their spies on the outskirts of town, who report via radio waves as soon as Brazil’s environmental police pass the bridge for a raid.

Gold diggers use mercury

After a five-hour drive you are in a nature reserve – and yet you can see hustle and bustle everywhere. Gold diggers bring spare parts to their claims with jeeps or motorbikes. Thousands of them dig countless five-meter-wide holes in the jungle floor – in the hope of fat prey. They use mercury for this and leave behind a kind of lunar landscape.

They know that the Amazon is the largest remaining area of ​​rainforest on earth. Its size corresponds to the distance from Berlin to Baghdad and there are more than 40,000 species of plants and 427 known species of mammals. But the gold diggers are more interested in how they can feed their families and finance their children’s studies. There is nothing more lucrative in this area than prospecting, they say. In addition, it is “honest work”.

200 million euros from Germany for reforestation

The fact that left-wing President Lula da Silva has now announced a “zero deforestation strategy” by 2030 in Brazil made governments, like the traffic lights in Germany, rejoice. Since then, German government officials have been traveling to Brazil full of hope and shaking hands: first Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Environment Minister Steffi Lemke, then Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, finally Economics Minister Robert Habeck and Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir.

During her visit at the end of January, Development Aid Minister Svenja Schulze promised 200 million euros in Amazon emergency aid for the first 100 days of the Lula government.

Amazon fund reactivated under Lula

The money, which is just a start, will be used to finance projects for reforestation and support for small farmers. It is about the sustainable use of the Amazon forest, which should be preserved as one of the tipping points of the climate.

The Amazon fund was also reactivated with Lula, which aims to protect the jungle – for example by financing fire-fighting aircraft for firefighting.

322 square kilometers of rainforest destroyed in February

However, Lula’s promise to stop illegal deforestation by 2030 is unlikely to be kept. This is shown by the deforestation data from February. According to the State Institute for Space Research (INPE), 322 square kilometers of Amazon rainforest were destroyed in February alone – an area the size of Munich and an increase of 62 percent compared to the previous year. Never since the beginning of satellite monitoring has more jungle been cleared in one February.

It shows how tedious the fight against invaders has been since ex-President Jair Bolsonaro deliberately and systematically weakened state environmental protection measures. He encouraged illegal loggers, gold miners and ranchers to use the rainforest economically – even in indigenous protected areas.

Bolsonaro continued the Amazon politics of the 1960s

Bolsonaro and his supporters have the Amazonian politics of the 1960s and 1970s in mind. At that time, the military dictators had issued the control of the jungle as their top priority. To do this, they built thousands of kilometers of roads through the rainforest and settled people from distant, poorer regions.

Since then, the Amazon population has literally exploded and every inhabitant wants to build up a little piece of wealth for themselves. Many do not shy away from illegal methods.

This is one of the reasons why the destruction of the jungle in the 1990s had taken on enormous proportions. The largest deforestation to date was registered in 1995: more than 29,000 square kilometers of primeval forest were destroyed within twelve months. That’s almost the size of Belgium. When Lula began his first term in 2003, he ramped up environmental protection efforts, bringing 2012 to its lowest annual level to date. Under ex-president Dilma Rousseff, the jungle shrank by only 4,600 square kilometers – an area almost twice the size of Saarland.

Weakened environmental police and empty coffers

Under Bolsonaro, deforestation rose again in 2022, more than doubling to 11,600 square kilometers. Germany is now hoping that Lula will turn things around again. Although he appointed Marina Silva, an environment minister who has been fighting to preserve this ecosystem for decades, there are still countless hurdles.

Lula has to strengthen the environmental police, which Bolsonaro had weakened in terms of personnel and finances, for their raids in this huge area. In addition, he has to ramp up many other protective measures. That costs a lot of money, which Lula actually doesn’t have when looking at his cash register.

Financial help from abroad required

That’s why Brazil’s President is also relying on financial aid for jungle protection from abroad. The green light comes from Germany. The Federal Government wants to become more involved in South America as part of global climate protection. But that may take time, because permanent control over such a large and difficult-to-access area is difficult to achieve.

In addition, there are inefficient practices. For example, cattle breeders who use newly cleared areas often have just one animal per hectare of land. It is not uncommon for speculators to operate in the background, earning a fortune by clearing land because this increases the value of the property.

In addition, it is easy to overlook the fact that deforestation is not only high in the Amazon, but also in other primeval forests in Brazil, such as the Cerrado and the Atlantic rainforest, which often escape the attention of the international public.

“Zero deforestation strategy” unlikely to be achieved by 2030

The “zero deforestation” strategy for the Amazon promised by President Lula is unlikely to be achievable by 2030. It looks more like a slogan in the fight against the backsliding of the Bolsonaro government. The Amazon has shrunk every year since records began, even under Lula’s previous two terms. That this will ever stop could soon turn out to be utopian.

The gold diggers in Novo Progresso, at least, will do the same as ever should the environmental police show up. They hide deep in the jungle with their engines, gold and fuel for a few days before returning and mining as before.