Desired by Lula, partnership with Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo may come out under Bolsonaro at COP27

Owners of the largest tropical forests in the world, Brazil, Indonesia and the DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) intend to launch the “OPEC of forests”. The nickname is inspired by the strength that OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) has over the course of the global market and international relations.

With the alliance, countries must coordinate to adopt joint positions in negotiations on forests, such as the COPs on climate and biodiversity. A two-page joint declaration is undergoing final adjustments and may also be published at COP27, the UN climate conference, which takes place until the 18th in Egypt.

Although the idea was publicized in international press vehicles as an articulation of the president-elect, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the construction of the partnership took place over the last year, during the Bolsonaro administration, according to the MMA (Ministry of the Environment) and also according to government officials in Indonesia and the DRC.

People close to Lula’s environmental agenda stated to the report that the idea is in the president-elect’s plans and that it had already been sought in previous PT administrations, when Brazil created an alliance with countries in the Panamazonia and even tried to include African nations. and from Indonesia.

In early August, Aloizio Mercadante, then coordinating Lula’s government program, cited the proposal to bring Brazil, Indonesia and the DRC together in a partnership on forests.

The speech took place during a lecture by the American economist Jeffrey Sachs, a renowned researcher on sustainable development, at the Perseu Abramo Foundation. On that occasion, he was invited by Mercadante to serve as a consultant on the country’s positions on carbon credits in international negotiations.

According to representatives of the governments of the three countries, the idea began to be conceived at COP26, which took place a year ago, in Scotland.

According to Agus Justanto, director of sustainable forest management at the Ministry of Environment and Forest of Indonesia, the initiative for the conversation would have come from his country. “But this was stopped for a few months and more recently we received an email from Brazil, which arrived in the economic folder, and we resumed”, he says.

“We started to deal with a proposal for a partnership on forests with Brazil back in 2012, only later did it arrive in Indonesia,” he told Sheet the chief economist of the Ministry of Finance of the Democratic Republic of the DRC, Jean Paul Boketsu Bofili, who accompanies the meetings.

For Marcelo Donnini Freire, secretary for the Amazon and for environmental services at the MMA, who participated in meetings with the two countries, “the ones who have to push the forest agenda in the world are the great forest countries in the world”.

“We need to be coordinated and united to preserve and not prostitute the value of environmental assets. If we are not coordinated, there is a chance that we will start cannibalizing ourselves”, he adds.

The Itamaraty’s position on the defense of forests maintains understandings that cross governments, which helps to explain how the same partnership can be desired by two administrations with opposing visions —since the current president has implemented an anti-environmental policy since he took office, while Lula made the climate agenda one of his priority themes in this last election campaign.

However, the partnership can take on quite different contours depending on who is in power when it is closed.

Under Bolsonaro, Brazil’s joint positioning effort with Indonesia and the DRC, as well as other developing countries with large forest reserves, has been in the direction of avoiding international commitments to increase environmental protection, according to joint positions sent by the countries in negotiations. of climate and biodiversity.

Before the meeting of the G20 environment ministers, which took place in August in Bali, Brazil and Indonesia led a joint reaction with 11 countries against the European Union’s proposal to stop the import of commodities linked to deforestation. The main criticism of the group of 13 countries is the unilateral action of the Europeans.

Under Lula, Brazilians and partner countries expect investment in South-South cooperation, a hallmark of PT’s management.

In principle, the alliance does not involve an executive body and does not provide for a fund for the three countries or lines of technical cooperation between them, but representatives of the two countries said they hope that the partnership will leverage environmental protection policies through learning from Brazil, who was cited as a “guru” by a representative of the Indonesian government in conversation with the report.

Brazil is seen by countries that own forests as an example of implementing internationally negotiated mechanisms, such as Redd, which pays for results in environmental conservation and in Brazil it was implemented through the Amazon Fund.

The nickname “OPEC of the forests” also suffers from a “paternity” dispute. Avaaz campaign director Oscar Soria claims to have coined the term. The NGO encouraged articulation between countries during the G20 ministerial meeting. According to the MMA, however, the author of the term would be the secretary of climate and international relations of the ministry, Marcus Paranaguá.

_{The Planeta em Transe project is supported by the Open Society Foundations.}