Lula launches Amazon deforestation plan targeting 2030

The fifth phase of the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Amazon (PPCDAm), created during Lula’s first presidency and later suspended by Jair Bolsonaro, calls for authorities to compare financial records with rural land registries, other databases and satellite images. The checks are intended to identify illegal logging and cattle ranching; financial flows could also reveal purchases of chainsaws or excavators used in logging and illegal gold mining, Reuters reported.

The plan also proposes restoring degraded forests, expanding native vegetation through conservation incentives and sustainable forest management, and tracing wood, livestock and other agricultural products. It envisages developing a forest-based green economy through product certification, technical assistance, infrastructure, energy and internet access, and ecotourism. Full implementation beyond Lula’s current term would depend on his reelection or cooperation from a successor.

At the launch, Lula said Brazil would rebuild enforcement and monitoring capabilities he said had been dismantled over the previous four years. The government intends to increase action against illegal logging, mining, hunting and fishing in Indigenous territories, protected areas and the wider Amazon. Lula also cited the need to protect Indigenous people. The event took place on the first anniversary of the murders of British journalist Dom Phillips and Indigenous affairs specialist Bruno Pereira; Brazilian police have charged several people in connection with the killings.

The blueprint faces political and administrative hurdles. Environment agency IBAMA is short-staffed, a problem Reuters attributed to funding cuts under Bolsonaro, while the Associated Press described the plan as a response to congressional limits on Environment Minister Marina Silva, influenced by agribusiness interests. Preliminary government figures showed Amazon deforestation fell 68% in April compared with the same month a year earlier. Lula has also resumed recognition of Indigenous lands and secured a British contribution of £80 million ($100.97 million) to the Amazon Fund, backed as well by Norway, Germany and the United States.

During Bolsonaro’s four-year presidency, deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon rose 75% over the preceding decade, and Brazilian deforestation reached a 15-year high in 2021. The source reports that experts say an area twice the size of Germany would need reforestation to prevent the Amazon from reaching a point of no return. Lula acknowledged the scale of the 2030 goal, saying his administration was determined to meet it.