By LISZT VIEIRA*
Only a new post-capitalist model, a new way of life and production, will be able to ensure the survival of humanity on the planet.
“The blue sky is gone, we managed to cover the country with soot. We have to think about getting involved, getting involved with the biosphere of planet Earth, and not developing” (Ailton Krenak)
When she took office as Minister of the Environment in early 2023, Marina Silva proposed creating the Climate Authority, but this never came to fruition due to a lack of political support in the National Congress and the Executive itself. Now, with the climate tragedies that are hitting Brazil, the issue has come to the fore again in September 2024 and the proposal to create the Climate Authority for “Risk Management” is back on the agenda. But it runs the risk of not solving the problem.
It would be necessary to declare a State of Climate Emergency, with a Sustainability Council covering all Ministries. There is little point in having a Ministry of the Environment that cannot prevent environmental degradation caused, for example, by the Ministry of Agriculture supporting agribusiness that deforests forests, by the Ministry of Transportation supporting the paving of the BR-319 highway that will devastate the Amazon, and by the Ministry of Energy supporting oil exploration in the Foz do Amazonas basin.
The environmental crisis is extremely serious. The summer of 2024 is the hottest on record worldwide. The June-August period narrowly beats the previous record temperature set in 2023, according to the European climate change service Copernicus. It was the hottest summer on record in the northern hemisphere. Countries around the world have suffered heatwaves, floods, droughts and fires caused by man-made climate change. Calamities that have affected millions of people, killed thousands and caused billions of dollars in economic losses.
Global temperatures have already reached the limit of 1,5°C above pre-Industrial Revolution levels. This is the ceiling set by the Paris Agreement. Even with accelerated reductions, the increase in the planet's average temperature is expected to exceed 2°C, and could reach 2,5°C, according to scientists. Global emissions of all greenhouse gases (GHGs) were 32,7 billion tons of CO equivalent.2 (CO2eq) on 1990.
They reached 53,5 billion CO2eq in 2023. An increase of 63% between 1990 and 2023. The increase in greenhouse gas emissions from the energy, industry and transport sectors during the same period was much greater than the increase in total greenhouse gas emissions from all economic sectors. The graph below shows the increase in global temperature relative to pre-industrial levels.
But, as always happens, the poor are the most affected, especially those living in high-risk areas. The countries most affected by climate change are those that have contributed least to the emission of greenhouse gases, the main cause of the climate crisis, which is caused by the excessive use of fossil fuels (oil, gas, coal) and deforestation, which in some countries, such as Brazil, is the main culprit in the emission of these gases, especially CO.2.
Below is a table indicating the countries that have historically been most responsible for climate change. Brazil is in fourth place.
In September 2024, Brazil will have 5 fires across the country. In the Amazon, drought is at a record level. The Amazon is expected to lose 50% of its forest by 2070. It has gone from being the “cooled air of the world” to a major emitter of greenhouse gases. The Pantanal is under threat of disappearing. It has already shrunk by 30% in the last 30 years and is drying out. According to data from INPE, Brazil accounts for 76% of the fires in South America.
Drought and high temperatures help fires spread, but most of the fires are arson. Pollution levels in São Paulo have reached record levels due to drought and fires. The Amazon, Cerrado, Caatinga, all biomes are at risk. Heat waves are more lethal than rain. The elderly and children are more vulnerable. It is worth remembering that 2 million Brazilians live in areas at very high risk of landslides and floods.
Meanwhile, environmentalists, peasants, activists, and rural union leaders are being murdered on the agricultural frontier by agribusiness, livestock, mining, logging, and gold mining, etc. Brazil is the second country that killed the most environmental defenders in 2023, according to the CPT (Pastoral Land Commission). records of conflicts in the countryside in Brazil hit a record in 2023, with 2.203 occurrences. The majority (1.724) were due to land conflicts, characterized by invasions, expulsions, evictions, threats, destruction of property or gunfire suffered by small farmers, traditional communities and indigenous populations.
Since the beginning of the historical series, in 2012, 401 deaths of environmental defenders were recorded in the country. In the world, there were 2.106. An activist was murdered every two days on the planet last year.
An example of Brazil's disregard for environmental protection is the case of hydroelectric plants threatened by drought. When Brazilian hydroelectric plants were built, the government and the market only thought about the energy to be produced. Since environmental issues were ignored and the environment was considered a non-existent problem, it was not taken into account that, without water, there is no hydroelectric plant to produce energy.
Today, we see that, in addition to the disaster caused by deforestation and fires, the drought in the Amazon and Cerrado has greatly reduced the volume of water in rivers, which in some cases have dried up. The Amazonas, a state that is essentially a river, faced the worst drought recorded in over 120 years in 2023, and in 2024 this situation was repeated. The drought isolated communities and caused shortages in the interior of Amazonas. 20 cities declared a state of emergency due to the drought that caused the rivers of the Amazon to record below-average levels.
In addition to the Pantanal and the Amazon, the Brazilian Cerrado is also suffering from drought. The Cerrado is facing its worst drought in at least 700 years, according to study by USP researchers published in Nature Communications.. The rivers of the Cerrado are drying up.
The country still relies on thermal power when hydroelectric plants run dry. September 2024 will be the second worst month for water flow in reservoirs in 94 years. After the rationing of 2001, the country, in the face of the climate crisis, invested in the construction of thermal power plants to increase the security of energy supply, although it later experienced a boom in solar and wind power generation.
In 2024, Brazil recorded 164.543 forest fires, an increase of 107% compared to the same period in 2023. According to the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), from January to September, the country has almost reached the total of 189 thousand fires recorded throughout last year. According to the MapBiomes, one third of all native vegetation loss in Brazil has occurred in the last 37 years. According to Professor Paulo Saldiva of the USP School of Medicine, the fires will increase hospitalizations and mortality by 20% in the next 14 years.
It took the Portuguese a century to uproot two million brazilwood trees in the past. Today, in less than nine months, more than 361 million trees have been cut down in the Legal Amazon alone in 2022, according to data calculated by Greenpeace Brazil. We are in a new era, called Anthropocene, because climate change is caused by human action.
To face extreme weather events, droughts, floods, fires, heat waves, and storms, it will be necessary to create a new mentality and a new organization of private and public companies. The current capitalist model, with its environmental impact causing the destruction of biodiversity and natural resources, the climate crisis, and prioritizing profit, will lead the current human civilization to collapse. Only a new post-capitalist model, a new way of life and production, will be able to ensure the survival of humanity on the planet.
*Liszt scallop is a retired professor of sociology at PUC-Rio. He was a deputy (PT-RJ) and coordinator of the Global Forum of the Rio 92 Conference. Author, among other books, of Democracy reactsGaramond). [https://amzn.to/3sQ7Qn3]
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