Study Says Rousseff Administration Cut Anti-Deforestation Funding by 72%

03/31/2015 - 08h46

Research obtained by Folha has indicated that President Rousseff reduced funds to combat deforestation in the Amazon region to R$1.78 billion (US$551 million) in her first mandate - a fall of 72% compared to the government of her predecessor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

The research was conducted by the organization Infoamazônia. A report, "The Politics of Deforestation", will be published on Tuesday (31).

Anthropologist Ricardo Verdum gathered the data for spending on the Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Amazon (PPCDAm, in its Portuguese abbreviation), through Siga Brasil, a Senate public spending information system.

The Ministry of the Environment uses different figures, taking into account planned investment.

The report covers from 2007 to 2014, a period in which deforestation rates continued the negative trend which began in 2005. From 2003-04 to 2013-14 (July last year) the area of forest cleared plummeted from 27,772km2 to 4848km2, a reduction of 83%.

However, there are signs that deforestation may increase this year. Since last year, the Institute of Man and Environment in the Amazon (Imazon) has recorded 1702km2 of deforested land, an increase of 215% compared to the August-February period from the previous year.

However, this will only be confirmed by the publication of official data from the program Prodes, of the National Institute of Space Research (Inpe), at the end of the year.

According to Infoamazônia, the government has prioritized command and control operations. The report classified PPCDAm expenses, highlighting a worrying tendency in the Rousseff administration's environmental policy. Developmental programs - such as those aimed at supporting miners and sustainable management of the forest to extract timber - were hardest hit.

In Lula's second term (2007-2010), the government spent R$4.58 billion (US$1.4 billion) on such programs. From 2011 to 2014, spending fell to R$638 million (US$198 million) - a reduction of 86%.

Bureaucratic initiatives - such as revision of property rights and rural environmental registration - were less affected by the spending cuts. From R$820 million (US$254 million) in Lula's second term, they fell to R$436 million (US$135 million) under President Rousseff - a cut of 47%.

The item least affected by the cuts was monitoring and control. This includes joint operations involving the Environmental Agency (Ibama) and the Federal Police, and the modernization of the Prodes and Deter satellite systems. Spending fell from R$959 million (US$297 million) to R$703 million (US$218 million) - a reduction of 27%.

The Ministry of the Environment disagrees with the figures. The ministry also takes into account "planned investment" in the three phases of the plan: R$394 million (US$122 million), R$936 million (US$290 million) and R$1.4 billion (US$434 million).

"We do not agree with the figures used in the study, which should have analyzed the actions in the plan and verified how much has actually been executed," said a statement. "It may be observed that the study quotes values much higher than those which were planned, which causes confusion."

Translated by TOM GATEHOUSE

Read the article in the original language

	Ayrton Vignola - 17mai.05/Folhapress
	There are signs that deforestation may increase this year