Agro deputies criticize Lula and speak of a ‘hazy scenario’ in 2023

Allied with President Jair Bolsonaro (PL), the Agricultural Parliamentary Front held a meeting with sector leaders this Tuesday (22) with criticism of the elected president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), and in a sign that he will oppose to the future PT government.

“The scenario for 2023 is somewhat hazy. The government that is about to take over is not at all sympathetic to agribusiness, it sees agro in the wrong way”, said senator Zequinha Marinho (PL-PA), vice president of the FPA.

The president of the ruralist group, deputy Sérgio Souza (MDB-PR), said that the population’s view of agribusiness is corrupted by “urban legends, ideologically planted”.

🇧🇷[A esquerda coloca] in the minds of Brazilians that agro is bad for Brazil, that producing food with agricultural pesticides is putting poison on people’s food plates, that agro is responsible for global warming”, he added.

The most forceful speech was made by the president of the CNA (Confederation of Brazilian Agriculture and Livestock), João Martins. He stated that agribusiness cannot become a “battleground of ideas already dead and buried all over the world”.

“The already suggested return to the division of Brazilian rural production into family farming and commercial agriculture, in order to sacralize the first and demonize the second. This is an artificial division, with a strong ideological component, whose purpose is to politicize a productive activity.”

Martins also said that agro production does not deserve to be “burdened by institutional vices” and that, with Lula’s election, the “ghost of land invasions, treated with benevolence by public authorities, appears again on the horizon”.

A significant part of agribusiness allied with Bolsonaro in his campaign for re-election. The president even included tractors in the parade on September 7, at the Esplanada dos Ministérios, to signal the prestige of the sector in the government.

Bolsonaro also gathered donations from agricultural entrepreneurs to fund campaign actions. As Folha showed, at least two of them have debts with the Union.

Dissatisfied with Lula’s victory, companies in the sector have invested money in anti-democratic acts across the country that call for intervention by the Armed Forces to prevent the PT’s inauguration, under the allegation, without evidence, that there was fraud in the election.

The Leadership Meeting promoted by the FPA was attended by the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Carlos França, and of Agriculture, Marcos Montes, in addition to the President of the Chamber, Arthur Lira.

In the speech, França said that the Itamaraty, due to its function as a State, must “defend the interests of the agro”.

“In the international field, we have a lot to do. We have to fight so that measures that are, in principle, in defense of the environment are not, in fact, instilling protectionist actions that prevent Brazilian agro from gaining new markets that have to win,” he said.

“There is a concern with the continuity and sustainability of the agro [na gestão petista]🇧🇷 I think that we, from Itamaraty, have and will have in the next government a function of the State, which is to defend the interests of the agro”, he concluded.

Despite the signals given by agribusiness leaders in Congress, deputy Neri Geller (PP-MT) told the Sheet that the more moderate wing of the sector has already given in and started to seek dialogue with the new government.

“You have to talk. The election is over. If you represent the sector and you are not satisfied with something, with the funding, with the interest rate at 14%, which is absurd, you have to sit down at the table and claim it”, said.

Despite being sought after by industry associations, Geller recognizes that part of the agro remains linked to Bolsonarism. 🇧🇷[O cenário deve mudar] when we sit down at the table and show that what Lula and the PT government did for agriculture is infinitely greater than President Bolsonaro”, he added.