Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, says Lula, won the second round of the presidential election in Brazil, with 50.9% of the vote against incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro. “It’s a very good signal” for the planet, declares Catherine Aubertin, environmental economist, Monday, October 31 on franceinfo.
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For Catherine Aubertin, this is good news for the Amazon and the planet, because “Lula’s project is first of all to restore dialogue and the participation of societies in the development of policies“. According to the environmental economist and director at the Institute of Research for Development (IRD), outgoing President Jair Bolsonaro did just the opposite during his tenure as head of Brazil. “He really closed all the spaces of governance that the government of Lula had opened, that is to say all the consultation councils with civil society, the National Council for the Environment. This also directly affects the Amazon Fund: the Fund’s management committee has been paralyzed by the scenario for four years. This blockage by President Bolsonaro has deprived the defenders of the Amazon of a billion dollars”recalls Catherine Aubertin.
During his tenure, “Bolsonaro cut off all state environmental bodies. Whether it was the environmental police who could no longer impose fines, the ICMBio (Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation) who managed the conservation units, no longer had a say.” Lula for his part has already sent an important signal. “He pledged to create a ministry of indigenous peoples”.
The one who works at the National Museum of Natural History hopes that Lula will also “reinstate the Amazonian Deforestation Control Prevention Plan, which he had put in place in 2004”. It resulted in a plan coordinated by ministries, partnerships between federated states and civil society. “These instances of dialogue will be able to act again.”
But nothing is won yet, warns Catherine Aubertin. The economist points out that Brazil is a federation of seven states. “Among the Amazon states, only the state of Pará and Maranhão have governors who support Lula”.
Especially since Lula’s priority is not ecology. This is “the fight against hunger”indicates the director of research at the IRD. “Then restore dialogue with society, after the international and the environment.”
In addition, the Amazon, which is a very important environmental symbol internationally, is less so in Brazil according to Catherine Aubertin: “It’s a remote region. It’s 10% of the GDP. Less than 10% of the population”.