Diego Oliveira Brandão, Julia Arieira, and Carlos Afonso Nobre
The science is clear: rehabilitating the Amazon rainforest is essential to mitigating climate change and reversing biodiversity loss. Indigenous knowledge must play a central role.
Brazil’s new Minister of Agriculture, Blairo Maggi, struggled to respond to civil society challenges at COP22, as the country’s commitment to environmental rights deteriorates.
Last week Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff launched an ambitious program to eradicate extreme poverty by 2014. Under the “Brazil Without Poverty” initiative, the government will spend $12.5 billion a year to expand cash transfers and health, education, and job training services for some 16 million people (8.5% of Brazil’s population) with incomes of up to $44 per month, who have failed to benefit from Brazil’s rapidly expanding economy.
The announcement comes as Rousseff continues to be challenged, in the international spotlight, by conflicts that expose the high cost of economic progress borne by Brazil’s most impoverished and indigenous communities.
