Pseudoscientific claims have contributed to the weakening of environmental policies since the 1990s in Brazil, reveals a study published this Tuesday (25) by the scientific journal Biological Conservation.
“The attack on environmental policies was driven by a systematic and veiled effort by a small group of opponents to misinform decision-makers and society,” says the article, which defines opponents — also called skeptics or denialists — as groups with scientific credentials that seek to influence public opinion and decision-makers to prevent the advancement of regulatory policies.
The research analyzed the strategies of a group led by agronomist Evaristo de Miranda, an Embrapa researcher known by the agribusiness and environmentalism sectors for presenting information that diverges from scientific data on environmental conservation in the country.
The study analyzed Miranda’s curriculum on the Lattes platform, where the researcher cites the publication of 83 texts as complete scientific articles.
Most, however, consist of essays or technical notes without academic validation. Only 17 of them were published in scientific journals. Among these, only ten articles are indexed in databases recognized by scientists.
In addition to publication in non-scientific journals and without the requirement of peer review, the study found that most of the texts do not provide details of methodology and do not provide data, which prevents the verification of information and debate in the scientific environment.
The study identified the impact of false controversies on public policies in four areas: Forest Code; indigenous lands and conservation units; sugarcane burning in São Paulo and fires.
“Most of the outbreaks registered in July were from fires in production systems that are not very technical”, stated Miranda in August of last year, in a text published on the website Revista Oeste.
However, according to Inpe (National Institute for Space Research), in July 2021 only 39% of fires were in areas of consolidated agricultural use, while 48% were recorded in areas deforested after 2017.
According to the study, Miranda’s argument was based on federal government decisions that dismantled environmental control and inspection policies.
In an article published in 2008, Miranda argued that the full implementation of the Forest Code would make agricultural production unfeasible in most of the country, for which only 29% of the national territory would remain.
The argument followed the production of oversized maps, which did not consider the proportionality of the conservation requirements of riparian forests as a function of the different sizes of the rivers.
When comparing the maps released by Miranda with hydrographic data and following the rules of the 1965 Forest Code, climatologist Carlos Nobre found that the numbers overestimated the areas of preservation of riparian forests by 309%.
“The scenario in which the Permanent Preservation Areas cannot be considered part of the Legal Reserve [das propriedades rurais] would lead to negative numbers [de áreas disponÃveis para a agricultura] in the Amazon and Pantanal”, defended the agronomist.
The process to amend the Forest Code gained momentum in the year after the article was published, in 2009, when mentions of the agronomist appear in 29 Congressional records. In 2012, Congress passed a new version of the law granting amnesty to 58% of illegal deforestation done until 2008.
“The misinformation presented by Miranda and collaborators played a central role in weakening the Forest Code,” says the survey, which analyzed 119 congressional documents that mentioned Miranda’s name.
Most of the mentions expressed support for his statements, coming mostly from parliamentarians from the ruralist bench.
The argument about the lack of land for agriculture was also used by Miranda to oppose the creation of protected areas. In a text published in 2008, he states that the demands for demarcation of indigenous lands and the creation of conservation units would exceed the size of the national territory.
As of 2010, the actions to create conservation units and demarcation of indigenous lands declined and since 2018 they have been paralyzed.
Another target of false controversies, environmental fines were drastically reduced in the Bolsonaro government on the grounds that they would be applied arbitrarily.
“There is a lot of arbitrariness. Fines are levied based on satellite images, flying over helicopters, without listening to the producer, without setting foot on the property to find out if the fine was authorized”, said Miranda in an interview with Canal Rural, at the end of 2018.
At the time, he had been invited by the then newly elected president to support the Bolsonaro government’s environmental project.
“Fines and embargoes supported the drastic reduction in deforestation between 2005 and 2007. Remote monitoring technology is used, but field actions play a central role and are highly effective in reducing deforestation”, counters the study, citing scientific research.
In articles published in 1994 and 1997, Miranda stated that burning sugarcane would be positive for the environment and would have no impact on human health.
The text served as a basis for the Justice to deny, in the 1990s, an action by the Public Ministry that
called for a ban on the practice.
The state of São Paulo only banned it in 2016, despite the scientific consensus on the health and environmental impacts of burning sugarcane — with evidence such as the increase in hospital admissions of children and the elderly and the loss of soil fertility.
“There are other examples of groups active with pseudoscientific information about vaccines, Covid-19 or climate change, but the case of Evaristo de Miranda stands out for its longevity, because it maintained influence over different governments, from FHC, Lula, Dilma to Bolsonaro, with impact in different areas of environmental policy”, says professor Raoni Rajão, the study’s main author and coordinator of the Laboratory of Environmental Services Management at UFMG (Federal University of Minas Gerais).
The study also had the participation of 12 researchers from UFMG, USP (University of São Paulo), Inpe, UnB (University of BrasÃlia), UFSC (Federal University of Santa Catarina) and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Spain). ).
The article also points out Miranda’s influence on presidential speeches. When addressing the UN General Assembly in 2019, President Jair Bolsonaro used data from the author. At that time, Itamaraty guidelines sent to diplomats abroad also followed Miranda’s data.
Last August, the Brazilian Embassy in Washington re-distributed an article by the author that denied the occurrence, in the previous month, of forest fires in the Amazon.
“By deeming them unworthy of attention, the scientific community has allowed false scientific claims to remain unchallenged. The academy is also to blame for the long and growing ability of false scientific controversies to influence policy,” says the article, which recommends opening up space. in scientific journals to “define and discuss false scientific controversies rigorously”.
Embrapa Territorial told the leaf who will not comment on the matter. Sought after, Evaristo de Miranda did not return to the report’s contacts.
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