On the eve of COP26, the United Nations conference on climate change, Congress decided to put green projects on the agenda, in an attempt to improve Brazil’s worn image at the event, which begins this Sunday (31) in Glasgow.
The president of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG), will attend the conference, as will congressmen linked to the environmental cause and agribusiness. The president of the Chamber, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), has not yet confirmed his presence.
In recent weeks, Lira, who has put on the agenda and approved some of the projects most criticized by environmentalists this year, has modulated her speech to include advocating for a greener agenda.
On Monday (25), the same day the federal government announced the national Green Growth program, the deputy participated in an agricultural consultancy event and said that it is necessary to “retake the spotlight of a country that has more than 60% of its areas preserved as native forests, whether public or private”.
The president of the Chamber also defended the project that creates the carbon market in the country. “We are not going to discuss the obligation now, but its regulation. We are going to deal with the voluntary nature of carbon credits,” he stated.
The project establishes goals for the emission of greenhouse gases for the industry and for the energy sector, explains the author of the project, the vice-president of the Chamber, Marcelo Ramos (PL-AM).
The text also proposes a compensation mechanism so that issuers that exceed the target can buy credits sold by those who have not reached the limit.
Ramos, who is going to the COP, defends that the project does not deal with a voluntary market — when companies spontaneously decide to neutralize greenhouse gas emissions.
“There is no place for the bill to regulate the voluntary market,” he said. “You cannot condemn companies that have already voluntarily reduced emissions.” The intention is to vote the text on Thursday (4).
Still in an effort to improve the image abroad, Lira voted for a project that establishes an integrated policy to fight forest fires in the country.
In the last 30 years, 1.64 million square kilometers of burned area have been burned, recalled Congressman Rodrigo Agostinho (PSB-SP), who filed this week a PEC (proposed amendment to the Constitution) that seeks to guarantee the right “to the environment ecologically balanced and to climate security”.
None of the initiatives, he said, will be enough to erase what is seen by environmentalists as setbacks approved by the Chamber this year, such as the project that facilitates the regularization of occupied lands or the one that makes environmental licensing more flexible — both are stuck in the Senate, which, according to Augustine, he has played “the role of moderator”.
For him, it is important that congressmen linked to agribusiness participate in events linked to the COP. “There is a reality check. Brazil wants to combat deforestation and has not created a national park or protected area, nor has it demarcated indigenous land,” he said.
“If you don’t have what to show, don’t want to go there thinking you’ll win something either [recursos para ajudar a preservar o meio ambiente]. Will not.”
In the neighboring house, the green agenda was also prioritized in an attempt to present a positive image at the COP. The senators abandoned the idea of ​​improving the proposals for environmental licensing and land regularization approved by the Chamber and bet on other projects.
Days after changing the Forest Code to allow municipalities to define protected areas along riverbanks, senators accepted a proposal that anticipates the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by five years.
According to the text, Brazil should reduce these emissions by 43%, by 2025, and by 50%, by 2030, compared to 2005.
To achieve this reduction, the proposal that went to the Chamber calls for the government to create a regulation that includes, necessarily, actions and instruments for the elimination of illegal deforestation and the promotion of sustainable agriculture.
The author of the proposal, senator Kátia Abreu (PP-TO), said she believes that this commitment will help reduce the European Union’s resistance to ratifying the trade agreement with Mercosur.
“Lira didn’t say anything about whether he’s willing to put this to the vote or not. It’s a more audacious goal,” said deputy Agostinho.
Another project that the senators want to vote on before the summit is the one that updates the National Policy on Climate Change with the commitments made by Brazil in the Paris Agreement and anticipates from 2060 to 2050 the deadline for neutralizing the country’s greenhouse gas emissions .
The participation of representatives of the Senate at the COP, however, should not be limited to the presentation of projects considered to be an advance.
On Wednesday (27), the CMA (Environment Commission) approved a report criticizing the government’s performance between 2019 and 2021 in the environmental area. The document will be taken by the commission members to the conference.
In the text, the rapporteur Eliziane Gama (Cidadania-MA) stated that the annual deforestation rates in the Legal Amazon have remained above 10 thousand square kilometers and that the Brazilian net emissions of greenhouse gases reached, in the period, the highest value. in the last 13 years.
For the executive director of Raps (Political Action Network for Sustainability), Mônica Sodré, there is a set of measures that place Brazil against the world.
“For a world that is now discussing how globally we are going to get out of the mess of climate change, both the Chamber and the Senate are giving very contrary signals to this,” he said. “The parliamentarians unfortunately are still not dealing with the issue with the urgency and speed that the issue demands.”
Green agenda in Congress
Chamber
carbon market regulation
It proposes a compensation mechanism so that issuers that exceed the target can buy credits sold by those who have not reached the established limit
fire management police
Establishes rules for the controlled use of fire to reduce forest fires and creates a national integrated fire management committee, linked to the Ministry of the Environment
Senate
Anticipation of the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions
The approved proposal determines that Brazil reduce these emissions by 43%, by 2025, and by 50%, by 2030, compared to 2005, through the elimination of illegal deforestation
Anticipating the deadline to 2050 to neutralize greenhouse gas emissions
Project that should be voted on next week updates the National Policy on Climate Change with the commitments assumed by Brazil in the Paris Agreement
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