July 23, 2021

11:07

Marcela Leiros – from Cenarium Magazine

MANAUS – The intensified illegal deforestation in Amazon has been pointed out as the result of an “anti-environmental” policy instituted by the federal government in which the main characters are from the Executive itself, such as president Jair Bolsonaro and the now former Minister of Environment, Ricardo Salles. Speeches and actions of these representatives are considered by experts to be an “endorsement” for environmental crimes.

“We have a minister there * [Ricardo Salles] who has two investigations being carried out by the Federal Police. We have the pairing of Ibama and ICMBio. We have career employees removed from their positions. And you have statements from the president saying that Ibama and ICMBio are ‘penalty industries’. A few weeks ago, in a live stream, he criticized ICMBio and the other day miners attacked the ICMBio base in Roraima. All this with the backing of the National Congress, which has been passing laws to further liberalize deforestation,” recalled the leader of Greenpeace Brazil’s burning and deforestation project in the Amazon campaign, Rômulo Batista.

The actions which the biologist refers can be illustrated in a particular episode, which occurred on April 22, 2020. At the time, during a ministerial meeting, Salles, who was in charge of the Ministry, made a request: “We need to make an effort here, while we are in this moment of tranquility in terms of press coverage, because we only talk about Covid, and go on passing the ‘cattle’, and changing all the (environmental) regulations, and simplifying norms,” he said.

The phrase of the former minister referred to a possible opportunity that the government should take, at a time when the focus of society and the media was on the pandemic of the new coronavirus, to change rules that can be questioned in court. A video of the speech was released at the time by the minister of the Supreme Court (STF), Celso de Mello. Since then, the federal government has continued this anti-environmental policy.

Former Minister under investigation

Ricardo Salles is investigated by the STF and was one of the targets of the Federal Police’s (PF) Akuanduba operation, carried out on May 19, on suspicion of facilitating the illegal exportation of wood from Brazil to the United States and Europe. Another accusation against the former minister came in April this year, when the former superintendent of the Federal Police in Amazonas, Alexandre Saraiva, sent a criminal report against Salles to the Supreme Court. In the document, the superintendent indicated the possibility of the crimes of administrative law, criminal organization, and the crime of “obstructing or hindering the supervisory action of the Public Power in dealing with environmental issues”.

The criminal report was related to the Federal Police’s Operation Handroanthus, between Pará and Amazonas, which resulted in the largest apprehension of native wood in history, with the retention of 131,000 cubic meters of logs. After the confiscation of illegally extracted wood from the Amazon, it is reported that farmers accused of land grabbing and involved in illegal logging have contacted Minister Salles “to solve the problem”.

On June 24, Salles resigned under strong accusations that could lead to a request for his arrest by Supreme Court Minister Alexandre de Moraes. With the resignation, the case changes instances and investigators, as Salles loses his privileged forum.

In his place, Joaquim Leite, former counselor of the Brazilian Rural Society (SBR), who is considered to be Salles’ right-hand man in the ministry, took over. The appointment of a new minister with such a profile is considered a strong indication that the federal government has no intention of changing the direction of environmental policy.

Weakened Fiscalization

Two important enforcement agencies, the Chico Mendes Institute for Conservation and Biodiversity (ICMBio) and the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama) have undergone restructuring. Salles determined a 24% cut in the annual budget foreseen for Ibama. With the cut, the environmental agency had its budget reduced from R$ 368.3 million to R$ 279.4 million. Fixed expenses alone are estimated at R$ 285 million.

The environmental area also went through a militarization process, with the substitution of directors and directors of environmental agencies, whose key positions were placed under the supervision of officers from the Armed Forces and the Military Police. Salles nominated five military police officers from São Paulo to be the president and directors of ICMBio.

Penalty Industry

The federal government has also created a regulatory body, called the “environmental conciliation core”, with the power to forgive or review environmental penalties, a measure that aims to combat what Bolsonaro called the “industry of penalties”, which threatens the subsistence of farmers and ranchers. The number of penalties applied by Ibama for illegal deforestation fell by 34% between January and May.

Still in the electoral campaign that elected him in 2019, Bolsonaro promised to end the environmental penalties applied by Ibama and that, for him, disrupt entrepreneurs and Brazilian producers. The president, himself already received a R$10,000 penalty for fishing in an ecological station in Angra dos Reis in 2012, has made other verbal attacks on inspection agencies.

*On the day of the interview with biologist Rômulo Batista, June 22, Ricardo Salles was still Minister of the Environment. He resigned from his position on June 23.*