Stories of clear skies and wildlife conquering urban areas might provide much needed comfort during these uncertain times as the health crisis unfolds. But in Brazil, where climate and environmental issues already lack attention and resources, the pandemic underscores the next crisis.
As the novel coronavirus spreads throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, social media have been rife with reports touting some of the environmental and climate benefits of the pandemic. Lower levels of pollution due to falling industrial output and the ’comeback‘ of wildlife into urban areas are cited as evidence that the crisis may have an environmental silver lining, even if temporary.
However, the pandemic also has highly negative impacts in the region. While there is a decrease in the amount of street trash in urban areas (about 55% in the city of São Paulo), households are producing more garbage. There has also been a boost in the disposal of toxic materials such as hospital waste—according to some estimates, this is expected to increase anywhere between 10 to 20 times during the pandemic. Likewise, there is an uptick in the consumption of household electricity and gas, even as industrial consumption falls.
In addition, the pandemic has facilitated a trend that was already observed in 2019: the acceleration of deforestation in the Amazon basin. According to satellite data from the Deter system of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE), the number of deforestation alerts in the Brazilian Amazon so far has increased by 51% in comparison to last year—the highest level during the entire data series, which started in 2016. There is a combination of factors driving this increase.
First, the government of Jair Bolsonaro continues to press for de-regulation of protected lands, especially for mining purposes. Second, even before legal changes are implemented, groups in the Amazon feel emboldened by the government's official discourse to invade land, whether to farm, ranch or in search of wood and minerals. Local organisations in the Amazon state of Roraima, on the Brazil-Venezuela border, report a sharp increase in the number of illegal miners invading the Yanomami Indigenous Land, precisely as the first deaths due to COVID-19 occur among Brazilian indigenous groups. And third, as other countries turn inwards to tackle their own COVID-19 challenges, international pressure on the Amazon governments (as seen in the aftermath of the peak in forest fires in mid-2019) to protect the forest has eased. Compounding these factors are the further weakening of monitoring institutions and new budgetary pressures, including the limited available resources for military operations to curb deforestation.
More broadly, yet just as pernicious, is the lack of attention being paid to climate change by leaderships within the region—and even by civil society and private sector actors, as they scramble to face the challenges of the pandemic. National and subnational governments are focusing heavily on obtaining protective equipment and other essential emergency supplies— sometimes clashing over these resources and other decisions related to the pandemic. This year’s Earth Day came and went with very little fanfare across the region. Even the limited amount of progress being made in poverty alleviation—for instance, the universal emergency basic income implemented in Brazil, or the support packages being offered to companies—are failing to take into account climate change.
Yet, post-pandemic recovery in the region must incorporate climate action, lest Latin American and Caribbean populations remain as woefully unprepared for the next catastrophe as they have been for the COVID-19 pandemic.
As India grapples with the worsening impacts of climate change, the need to strengthen its adaptation efforts has become more significant than ever. Climate diplomacy and mainstreaming climate adaptation into the most vulnerable sectors could provide some solutions to overcoming barriers, such as the lack of sustainable funding.
“Climate Security risks will materialise in very different ways and forms, whether we talk about Lake Chad or about the Arctic, Bangladesh and the Small Island Developing States,” said the EU’s Ambassador to the United Nations in New York, Joao Vale de Almeida, in his opening remarks. “But for the EU, there is no doubt, as underlined in 2016 in our Global Strategy, and reaffirmed by the 28 Ministers of Foreign Affairs, that climate change is a major threat to the security of the EU and to global peace and security more generally,” he said.
The challenges facing the international community are growing while the willingness to cooperate seems to be waning. Foreign policy must help bridge this gap. One way to accomplish this is by pushing forward a major achievement of multilateralism: the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. At a side event during the 2019 High-Level Political Forum, diplomats and policy experts discussed the role of foreign policy in the global sustainability architecture.
Global progress towards achieving the SDGs is slow, and for many targets, off track. While SDG implementation is primarily a national task and responsibility, it also requires concerted international cooperation. This article presents two arguments why foreign policy could play an important role in their achievement.