BRAZIL:BRAZIL'S NEW environment minister takes office today in the middle of a row over an apparent recent increase in deforestation in the Amazon region.
The dispute concerns satellite data on deforestation and punitive measures based on that data taken by the government against ranchers and farmers in the worst- affected regions.
The government sees the clampdown as essential for slowing deforestation. But one of the world's leading Amazon scientists has told the Financial Times the measures are "just wrong" and could precipitate "a new wave of anarchy".
Inpe, a space research institute that provides satellite monitoring of the Amazon, had been expected to release data yesterday showing an increase in deforestation this year, especially in the state of Mato Grosso on the southern rim of the Amazon, which has seen agriculture significantly expand over the past four decades.
But Gilberto Camara, director of Inpe, said he decided not to release the data because it would "only throw more fuel on to the fire", preferring to wait until Carlos Minc, the incoming minister, was more fully in command. "We need measured responses," he said.
Mr Minc commented on the figures last week, saying deforestation in Mato Grosso had increased by 60 per cent. He blamed Blairo Maggi, the state governor who is also one of the world's biggest soya farmers, who said he would plant soya all the way to the Andes if given the chance.
Mr Maggi contested the figures, saying his state's environment inspectors had been to areas identified by Inpe to find, for example, that new deforestation had been recorded in areas long since cleared of natural vegetation.
Mr Camara defended Inpe's methods, saying Brazil had the best tropical forest monitoring in the world and that its policy was to make all data publicly available for verification in the field.
However, Daniel Nepstad of the Woods Hole Research Centre, who has spent 20 years studying the Amazon, said Inpe's data should not be used without such verification because the pixels produced by the satellite images were too large for precise measurements. "Defining government actions based on very uncertain data is just wrong," he said.
Recently released Inpe data appear to show an increase in deforestation after several years of decline. From a recent high of 27,000sq km in the year to July 2004, the amount of land cleared in the Amazon fell to 11,200sq km to July 2007. But preliminary data suggests the figure this year will be as much as 13,300sq km.
Based on preliminary figures, the government announced in January punitive measures against ranchers and farmers in the 36 counties with the highest rates of deforestation. From July subsidised farm finance will be denied to producers who fail to prove that their properties are within the law or that they are taking steps to meet legal requirements: this includes preserving the forest on 80 per cent of their land.
"There has been a very unfortunate battle between the government and the farm sector since the release of the numbers for late 2007," Dr Nepstad said. "The quality of the data . . . did not justify the size of the punitive measures, which have criminalised the sector just as it is in the middle of a great experiment" - a reference to a soya moratorium under which traders have stopped buying soya from deforested land since 2006.
Similar private initiatives are under way among ranchers to encourage them to adopt better practices and replant areas.
A Bill in congress would reduce the forest reserve requirement to 50 per cent, a change the government opposes. But Dr Nepstad said the change would recognise that the 80 per cent rule was "unattainable and only perpetuates the lawlessness that has characterised the Amazon all along".
- (Financial Times service)