{"id":7244,"date":"2019-01-30T15:10:55","date_gmt":"2019-01-30T17:10:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.amazoniasocioambiental.org\/?p=7244"},"modified":"2019-01-30T15:12:25","modified_gmt":"2019-01-30T17:12:25","slug":"bolsonaro-government-reveals-plan-to-develop-the-unproductive-amazon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/radar\/bolsonaro-government-reveals-plan-to-develop-the-unproductive-amazon\/","title":{"rendered":"Bolsonaro government reveals plan to develop the \u2018Unproductive Amazon\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wpb-content-wrapper\"><p>[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: right;\">Jan Rocha<\/h4>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: right;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/\">Mongabay<\/a><\/h4>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: right;\">28 January 2019<\/h4>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: right;\">Brazilian Amazon<\/h4>\n<p>[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Bolsonaro administration Chief of Strategic Affairs Maynard Santa Rosa last week announced new Brazilian mega-infrastructure projects that include a dam on the Trombetas River, a bridge over the Amazon River, and an extension of the BR-163 highway from the Amazon River through 300 miles of rainforest to the Surinam border.<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Santa Rosa, a retired general, said that these Amazon biome infrastructure projects had as their purpose the integration of what he called an \u201cunproductive, desertlike\u201d region into \u201cthe national productive system.\u201d<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>The Trombetas region contains 4 indigenous reserves, 8 quilombo communities and 5 conservation units.<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>In his radio announcement the official provided few details on the projects, saying nothing about costs, where the money to build would come from, what the socio-environmental impacts might be, or the timeline for the construction.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>With Brazil\u2019s Bolsonaro administration not even a month old, the new president\u2019s Chief of Strategic Affairs last week announced plans to build a bridge over the Amazon River in Par\u00e1 state in order to begin developing what he called an \u201cunproductive, desertlike\u201d region \u00ad\u2013 a reference to the Amazon rainforest.<\/p>\n<p>Maynard Santa Rosa, a retired army general and one of seven military ministers in the new government, said the administration plans major construction projects centered on the Trombetas River, which flows into the Amazon from the north, so as to integrate the region into the \u201cnational productive system.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The projects to be built include a hydroelectric dam on the Trombetas River, a 1.5 kilometer (0.9 mile) bridge over the Amazon at the small town of Obidos, and an extension of the BR-163 highway from Santarem north to Brazil\u2019s frontier with Surinam, a distance of roughly 480 kilometers (300 miles).<\/p>\n<p>The general has named the project the<em>\u00a0Barao do Rio Branco Plan<\/em>\u00a0in honor of the 19<sup>th<\/sup>century diplomat who negotiated border treaties with Brazil\u2019s neighbors. He made his announcement last week in an exclusive interview to the official radio program\u00a0<em>Voz do Brasil<\/em>, thus avoiding any hard questions on the project\u2019s feasibility or environmental impacts.<\/p>\n<p>Santa Rosa justified the project, saying, \u201cThe Amazon has a population of 10 million people living below the poverty line. We can\u2019t close our eyes to this anymore. We must integrate this unproductive\u00a0<em>latifundio<\/em>\u00a0[big unfarmed estate] into the national productive system and provide them with opportunities for jobs and income.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He said the dam will boost Brazil\u2019s energy capacity, providing electricity for aluminium processing and putting an end to frequent power outages in the cities of Manaus and Boa Vista. The BR-163 extension, if built, will allow for the trucking of grain from the Brazilian interior to the nation\u2019s northern border. He said the project would also have other, unspecified, benefits.<\/p>\n<p>The southern section of the BR-163 already exists, running hundreds of miles from Mato Grosso state north to the river port of Santarem in Par\u00e1 state. The highway is currently used by agricultural producers to transport soy to the grain terminals at Mirituba and Santarem on the Tapaj\u00f3s River, where it is transferred to ships for the trip down the Amazon River for export to the European Union and other nations.<\/p>\n<p>General Santa Rosa did not explain how extending the road hundreds of miles north through dense rainforest to an uninhabited border with Surinam would benefit soy exporters.<\/p>\n<p>He also made no mention of the indigenous and quilombo populations (the descendants of runaway slaves) who live in the area that he described as\u00a0<em>desertica<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 a totally inaccurate word with which to describe the world\u2019s largest tropical rainforest and its inhabitants.<\/p>\n<p>For Lucia Andrade, executive coordinator of the Pro-Indian Commission, a Brazilian NGO defending indigenous rights, the project will put at risk \u201ca region of the Amazon which is a mosaic of indigenous and quilombo areas and conservation units of great importance, not only to the population who live there but to the entire planet. To call it an\u00a0<em>unproductive latifundio<\/em>\u00a0is a big mistake.\u201d\u00a0 The Trombetas region contains 4 indigenous reserves, 8 quilombo communities and 5 conservation units.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-7241 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Protected_areas_of_northern_Para_state.svg_.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"571\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Protected_areas_of_northern_Para_state.svg_.png 800w, https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Protected_areas_of_northern_Para_state.svg_-300x214.png 300w, https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Protected_areas_of_northern_Para_state.svg_-768x548.png 768w, https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Protected_areas_of_northern_Para_state.svg_-500x357.png 500w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><strong><em>Protected areas of northwest Par\u00e1 state. The BR-163 extension from the Amazon River north to Surinam, though a precise route has not been announced, would diminish the integrity of several of these preserves, likely including the The Gr\u00e3o-Par\u00e1 Ecological Station (Esta\u00e7\u00e3o Ecol\u00f3gica Gr\u00e3o-Par\u00e1). Managed by Par\u00e1 state, this preserve protects 42,458 square kilometers (16,393 square miles) of Amazon rainforest, and is one of the largest fully protected tropical forest conservation units in the world. This map does not include indigenous reserves or quilombo communities. Image by Aymath2 courtesy of Wikipedia.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>She added that, at a time when the Environment Ministry has been deliberately weakened and responsibility for environmental licensing has been transferred to the Ministry of Agriculture, the Bar\u00e3o do Rio Branco project is extremely worrying.<\/p>\n<p>General Santa Rosa\u2019s announcement represents the latest in a long line of mega-infrastructure projects, proposed over the last 50 years by both military and civilian governments to \u201cdevelop\u201d the Amazon by means of roads, dams, industrial waterways, railways, and in this case, a major bridge. General Santa Rosa\u2019s description of the project seems reminiscent of the position of Brazil\u2019s military dictatorship which ended more than three decades ago, and treated the Amazon as an empty wilderness, while disregarding the cultures and livelihoods of indigenous and traditional populations who have lived there for centuries.<\/p>\n<p>Brazil\u2019s 1988 constitution rejected this outmoded mindset in which the Amazon rainforest \u2013 valued today for its human and natural diversity, and vital to maintaining global climate stability \u2013 is seen instead as a physical obstacle that must be overcome to benefit the advancement of Brazilian agribusiness and mining commodity development and export.<\/p>\n<p>The Bolsonaro administration, by naming its project after the Bar\u00e3o do Rio Branco, seems intent on not only honouring a Brazilian diplomat, but also harking back to the 19<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0Century\u2019s exploitative attempts to build railways to export Amazon rubber. In recent decades, the government emphasis has shifted to large-scale infrastructure schemes by which to export soy from the Brazilian interior via new roads like the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2017\/02\/getting-there-the-rush-to-turn-the-amazon-into-a-soy-transport-corridor\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">BR-163 in the Tapajos basin<\/a>, the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2018\/10\/purus-madeira-journey-to-the-amazons-newest-deforestation-frontier\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">BR-319 in the Maderira basin<\/a>, the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2018\/10\/grainrail-2nd-revolution-in-brazilian-agribusiness-and-amazon-threat\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">proposed Grainrail<\/a>, and a number of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2016\/08\/planned-tapajos-industrial-waterway-a-potential-environmental-disaster\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">Amazon industrial waterways.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>General Santa Rosa did not mention Brazil\u2019s legal requirement for environmental impact assessment studies or environmental licencing, but if the proposed dam involves the flooding of indigenous territories, authorization from the National Congress will be needed. Also, the indigenous communities must be consulted under national and international law, including the International Labour Organization\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ilo.org\/dyn\/normlex\/en\/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:12100:0::NO::P12100_INSTRUMENT_ID:312314\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener\" data-wpel-link=\"external\">Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention (No. 169),<\/a>\u00a0of which Brazil is a signatory.<\/p>\n<p>Several ministries will be involved in the planning, and the project is expected to be officially announced within the next two months by means of a presidential executive order, which will prevent any initial congressional scrutiny. However, the president\u2019s order must be approved by the legislature within 90 days, or it is nullified.<\/p>\n<p>Yet the biggest obstacle to the Plan is likely to be financial, as the proposed projects would require billions of dollars in investments. In his interview, General Santa Rosa did not mention any cost figures, or where the money will come from at a time when Brazil is subject to strict austerity measures with a tight limit on government spending.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"fPJvz1rcFt\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2019\/01\/bolsonaro-government-reveals-plan-to-develop-the-unproductive-amazon\/\">Bolsonaro government reveals plan to develop the \u2018Unproductive Amazon\u2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; clip: rect(1px, 1px, 1px, 1px);\" src=\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/2019\/01\/bolsonaro-government-reveals-plan-to-develop-the-unproductive-amazon\/embed\/#?secret=fPJvz1rcFt\" data-secret=\"fPJvz1rcFt\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" title=\"&#8220;Bolsonaro government reveals plan to develop the \u2018Unproductive Amazon\u2019&#8221; &#8212; Conservation news\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bolsonaro administration Chief of Strategic Affairs Maynard Santa Rosa last week announced new Brazilian mega-infrastructure projects that include a dam on the Trombetas River, a bridge over the Amazon River, and an extension of the BR-163 highway from the Amazon River through 300 miles of rainforest to the Surinam border.<br \/>\nSanta Rosa, a retired general, said that these Amazon biome infrastructure projects had as their purpose the integration of what he called an \u201cunproductive, desertlike\u201d region into \u201cthe national productive system.\u201d<br \/>\nThe Trombetas region contains 4 indigenous reserves, 8 quilombo communities and 5 conservation units.<br \/>\nIn his radio announcement the official provided few details on the projects, saying nothing about costs, where the money to build would come from, what the socio-environmental impacts might be, or the timeline for the construction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":7241,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-radar","category-3","description-off"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7244","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7244"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7244\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7250,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7244\/revisions\/7250"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.raisg.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}