Three Brazils await Lula’s arrival at COP27 to review climate future

The expectation of NGOs, governors of states in the Amazon and even Brazilian diplomacy in this Climate COP is not in the international meetings, but in the nod coming from within: the reorientation of climate policy under Lula’s presidency.

With a fragmented representation, the country has three pavilions at the COP: one official, another for NGOs and a third, unprecedented, formed by the governors of the Consortium of the Legal Amazon.

Although they present three Brazils to the world, they share the expectation that the rescue of climate policy by the federal government will recover internal and external dialogue on the climate agenda.

Lula should attend the COP in the second week of the conference, which began this Sunday (6th) and runs until the 18th. For civil society organizations, the opportunity is to reopen the dialogue with the federal government.

Before the Bolsonaro administration, the country had a single pavilion and distributed credentials for researchers, NGOs and social movements to participate in the conference as part of the country’s official delegation.

Another practice abandoned by the Bolsonaro government was to hold meetings with civil society, throughout the COP, to account for the progress of negotiations and possible consonances or contradictions with domestic policies.

The Brazil Climate Hub was created by NGOs, under the coordination of Instituto Clima e Sociedade, in response to the absence of an official Brazilian pavilion at the first COP of the Bolsonaro government, which took place in Madrid in 2019.

Unlike NGOs, the expectation of the governors gathered in the Consortium of the Legal Amazon involves the consolidation of a leading role conquered precisely by the absence of the Bolsonaro government on the climate agenda.

In the last four years, state governments have assumed a “paradiplomacy”, directly seeking international investment and closing partnerships without going through the federal government.

The region could emerge strengthened from a new relationship with the federal government, balancing partnership and protagonism, according to interlocutors linked to the consortium. For this, it is strategic to bring together governors in the region – such as the governor of Pará, Helder Barbalho (MDB), who invited Lula to participate in the COP, and the governor of Amapá, Waldez Góes (PDT), who presides the Amazon Consortium and also contacted the president.

In addition to raising tensions with the current government, Lula’s arrival at the COP can serve as a political signal for Brazilian diplomacy.

THE Sheet found that Itamaraty has been looking for signs from the transitional government about a reorientation of the climate agenda. However, the short time between the presidential election and the COP would have made this approximation difficult.

Even so, Itamaraty’s stance in past COPs showed a change of tone in the delegation’s behavior. In 2018, the COP that took place shortly after Bolsonaro’s election had a more timid role on the part of Itamaraty – which, despite resisting changing State positions according to the moods of governments, left a constructive stance to one side.

Brazil’s role is to build bridges, a negotiator told the report. The diplomacy’s expectation is that a high-level political signal from the new government will allow the return of Brazilian leadership in the negotiations.

The last climate conference under the Bolsonaro government reveals to the world an even more fragmented country, represented in three different pavilions at COP27.

Of the three representation spaces in the country, the official stand has the largest area —500 m2— and is sponsored by the national confederations of industry (CNI) and agriculture (CNA). The other two Brazilian spaces at the COP represent civil society organizations, gathered in the Brazil Climate Hub, and the Legal Amazon Consortium, formed by the region’s state governments. Both actors made parallel representations of the country at international conferences, in clear opposition to Bolsonaro’s anti-environmental policy.

The three stands are located on the same corner of the COP. The Consortium’s space faces one of the entrances to the official Brazil stand, which, in turn, is just one block from the NGO hub.

The proximity promises to increase the political tension between representatives of the current government and the participants of the other two Brazilian spaces. The pavilions of governors and NGOs have invited the president-elect, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and are expecting his visit next week, although they have not yet confirmed the agenda.

Former Environment Minister and elected federal deputy, Marina Silva (Rede-SP), should follow Lula’s agenda at the COP, as well as Senator Simone Tebet (MDB-MS).

They are quoted to assume, respectively, the ministries of the Environment (MMA) and Agriculture (Mapa). Other names are still in dispute for MMA, such as Senator Randolfe Rodrigues (Rede-AP), who is still evaluating whether to participate in the COP.

The expectation of Brazilians and foreigners is that Lula, in addition to the visit and bilateral visits with international partners, will bring to the COP announcements about the future of Brazilian environmental policy.

The confirmation of a name to command the Environment or related portfolios to be created – such as the already promised Ministry of Native Peoples or the suggested Secretariat for Climate Emergencies – is one of the awaited possibilities.

Another hypothesis raised by Brazilian environmentalists is an announcement of a review of Brazil’s climate goals under the Paris Agreement (the so-called NDCs, or nationally determined contributions).

They suffered a setback when they were updated during the Bolsonaro government, which was dubbed the “climate pedaling”, for changing the accounting of the parameters used to calculate the climate target.

The nods would help to inject confidence in the rescue of the Brazilian role in the climate agenda and, in addition, could have an indirect effect on the negotiations: Brazil could reassure the priority of the climate agenda for the world, precisely in a global context that pulls the leaders’ attention to new urgencies, such as the consequences of the war in Ukraine for energy and food and the economic recovery after the Covid pandemic.

According to negotiators from the bloc of developed countries, the resumption of the Brazilian climate commitment signaled by Lula generates double expectations for the world.

The first is about the impact on the climate: the promise to control deforestation – to bring it to zero by the end of the decade – helps to nurture hopes that the world will manage to halve global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.

The second expectation is about the contribution to the multilateral system. Recognized by different blocs of countries for its skillful diplomacy, Itamaraty was considered one of the key actors in the construction of the Paris Agreement, mediating understanding between the developed bloc and the developing countries.

Once elected, Bolsonaro considered leaving the Paris Agreement and changed his mind after hearing from agribusiness about the economic importance that the climate commitment would have for Brazilian exports.

The sector supported the reelection of its government and sponsors the Brazilian space at COP27, through the support of the National Agriculture Confederation. In a note released after Lula’s election, the organization asked for the president’s support to “protect national production from barriers to trade that are open or disguised as concerns about health and the environment.”