In the role of virtual host, US President Joe Biden Will host 40 heads of state including Brazilian representative Jair BolsonaroAt the so-called Climate Leadership Summit on 22 and 23 April.
The event is seen as a central opportunity for Biden to assume the role of a global political hero in climate issues, an agenda he reiterated as his management priority during the entire 2018 election campaign, making him Emerged victorious.
For the first time in history, Biden created the rank of Special Climate Envoy in the US federal administration, giving John Kerry a mission to make the Democrats’ green agenda possible domestically and internationally.
“America is back”, a motto of the current US government, will need to be proved in the actions of the White House leader. Over the past four years, Americans had consistently moved from blanks to multilateral debate and joint dialogue tables between foreign leaders. This was so in relation to the Paris Climate Agreement. World Health Organization (WHO), It was so with the nuclear deal Will.
The change in US foreign policy by former President Donald Trump advocated a rapprochement with opponents of the populist and conservative world for diplomatic efforts – or disruption – on issues central to the Republican election, such as with the United States Issue of trade dispute. . China Or a ban on the entry of migrants and refugees into the country. The administration’s motto was America – and Americans – first, and translated into American absence from global governance issues.
Now Democratic management tried to reestablish the role that the United States has assigned to itself as a beacon of the economic, democratic, and moral values of the West.. In his inauguration speech on 20 January, Biden announced, “We are going to repair our alliances not only by example of strength, but by leadership by example.”
On the same day, he signed the executive order Paris returned to United States in climate agreementFrom which former President Trump withdrew the Americans. And just seven days later they announced that the United States is not only returning to the climate negotiation table, but that they will hold themselves responsible for bringing this matter to the table at the leaders’ summit to be held in the coming days Will go.
Hey The event will serve to reassess commitments that Americans have overlooked in recent years, to protect the planet from warming above 1.5 degrees Celsius in the future.. The Biden government plans to announce ahead of the heads of states of 17 economies, together with 80% of greenhouse gas emissions and 4/5 of global GDP, more ambitious targets to reduce US CO2 emissions by 2030.
At the launch of the summit, the White House statement said, “In his invitation, the president urges leaders to use the summit as an opportunity to see how their countries will also contribute to stronger climate ambitions.”
“After leaving the debate, the United States now wants to show service and a large number of agreements with Summit countries, so that they can return to the arena with weights,” says Taso Azivedo, the emissions estimation system coordinator of greenhouse gases. Climate Observatory. The Leaders Summit is now also being seen as an important step towards more ambitious plans for the world’s superpowers at the 26th United Nations Conference on Climate Change, which will take place in Glasgow, England in November.
Biden says tropical forests are being destroyed in Brazil
It is in this context that Brazil appears as an opportunity for the Biden government to show the stability of its agenda and the tenacity of its arguments.
Bolsonaro was elected president with proposals to reduce environmental fines, hinder the demarcation of indigenous lands, and promote the interests of rural producers. The first two years of his mandate were marked by a gradual increase in deforestation. The rate of forest loss increased from 7,500 km2 in 2018 to 10,100 km2 and progressively jumped from 2019 and 11,100 km2. They were the highest value since 2008.
Still during the 2020 presidential campaign, Democrat Biden said he wanted to spearhead the effort to create a US $ 20 billion international fund to be given to Brazil to preserve the Amazon. Citing Brazil, Biden collected images of wildfire running the world in 2019 in the imagination of the American voter, In the first year of Bolsonaro’s administration.
“It is clear that there is a complete symbolism in dialogue with Brazil, which has been recognized globally as refractory to environmental protection. It would be the property of the Biden government to achieve a commitment to Boldnaro, not just international With an advantage at the level. US Democratic voter, who is very concerned with the matter, “a Brazilian diplomat who follows talks between Brazil and the USA on the subject, told BBC News Brasil.
The first approximation between the John Kerry team and Brazilian officials led by the Environment Minister Ricardo Sall And by the then Chancellor Ernesto Arajo, Seemed to produce positive impressions on both sides. On the American side, negotiators were surprised by Brazil’s willingness to consider the environmental issue as a “new priority”, as long as a financial consideration for the country’s forestry services was involved in the negotiations.
Among Brazilian diplomats, Carey and his team’s “humble” and “flexible” accents attracted the attention of Brazilian proposals at the forefront. In mid-April, for the British magazine The Economist, Carey said it was not for him to “dictate” what Brazil is and that it was “a government that felt the way it approached it so far is”. According to American diplomacy sources, Carey’s concern was not to upset the Bolsonaro administration, which could have completely halted costly negotiations for Americans..
However, in recent weeks, the US government has increased the amount of pressure for Brazil to have clear goals to tackle deforestation and conditioned any significant transfer of resources to the country for the presentation of results. This is in fact contrary to what Minister Salis has said publicly. In a recent interview with the newspaper O Estado DS Paulo, The head of the environment department said that he expected US $ 1 billion in advance payments. Per year so that Brazil is committed to reducing the catastrophe of Amazon by between 30% and 40%. Without being admitted in advance, Suls said that the country cannot offer any targets.
In view of the bargain, the US State Department sent Itamarty that there was no possibility of transfers without consequence. And that the future of other expensive agendas for Brazil will also depend on the success of climate negotiations, such as advancing bilateral trade agreements with the United States and maintaining US accession to the country. OECD. In reserve, representatives of a commercial organization from both countries, who attended meetings with diplomats from the United States and Brazil, confirmed that “the Americans made it very clear that they would not buy land on the moon”.
At the same time, the US government has increasingly pushed for expanding the scope of negotiations by indigenous groups, members of civil society, and even Brazilian governors and lawmakers. They all complained that the proposals taken by Salz and Arazo for Kelly did not represent the broader interests of Brazilian society, as there was no process for these groups to be heard publicly by the federal government.
Rainey tells Biden to ignore Bolsonaro
A month ago, in a letter published by BBC News Brazil, Brazilian Indigenous People’s Articulation (APIB) asked US President Joe Biden and climate envoy Kerry to have a “direct channel” of communication with the US government on issues related to Amazon . Brazil Last Tuesday (04/13), US Ambassador to Brazil Todd Chapman and Jonathan Pershing, one of Kerry’s advisers, both attended a meeting with Indigenous leaders.
Everything we told about the change in the Bolcero government’s environmental policy and they were concerned, they know who they are negotiating with. And we are aware of their pressing capacity and we are hopeful because this was an unprecedented opening of dialogue. “He told BBC News Brasil Dinaman Taksa, APIB coordinator.
The US representatives’ interaction with the Brazilian Indians was another indication of the Biden management that the declaration of a bilateral commitment on the 22nd would require the Brazilian government to offer concrete and consistent commitments.
There is a clear understanding within Itamarti that, without it, the country will not seize American resources. However, the potential target signal is weak. On this Wednesday (14/04), Vice President of the Republic Hamilton Mauro announced in the official gazette that the country functions with the hope of shutting down the Bolosaro administration with deforestation of around 8,700 km2 per year. This is definitely a shortcoming from the first two years of administration, but it is also a shortcoming More than 15% value from the level achieved in the first year of Bolsanaro’s inauguration. Brazilian negotiators also suspect that the figure would encourage Americans to open their wallets.
If a bilateral agreement fails, there is still a possibility of multilateral exit: a proposal to create a fund of about US $ 10 billion that will go to South American countries for the conservation of the region’s tropical biome. Thus, the US could use the weight of Brazil’s neighbors to increase the pressure on Bolsonaro’s environmental work.
Last week, the Biden government sent a high-level envoy to the region for the first time. Senior Director of the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council, Juan Gonzalez, visited Colombia, Argentina I Uruguay, Among other topics, to discuss the climate crisis. Brazil was not on a trip to Gonzalez.
