Smoke from burning vegetation rises in a rainforest in Yanomami Indigenous land, Roraima state, Brazil, March 2, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Brazil’s Amazon rainforest has experienced its largest blazes on record in the first four months of the year, with the environmental workers union on Monday placing partial blame on lower government spending on firefighting.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has staked his international reputation on protecting the Amazon rainforest and restoring Brazil as a leader on climate policy.

The Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, is vital to curbing catastrophic global warming because of the vast amount of greenhouse gas it absorbs.

A record drought in the Amazon rainforest region, driven by the El Nino climate phenomenon and global warming, has helped contribute to dry conditions fueling fires this year.

More than 12,000 square kilometers (4,633 square miles) of the Brazil’s Amazon rainforest burned between January and April, the most in over two decades of data, according to Brazil’s space research agency Inpe. That’s an area larger than Qatar, or nearly the size of the U.S. state of Connecticut.

Fires in the Amazon generally do not occur naturally but are ignited by people, often seeking to clear land for agriculture.

Firefighting budget cuts are also partially to blame, environmental workers union Ascema said in a statement. They complained that this year’s budget for environmental agency Ibama to fight fires is 24% lower than 2023.

In a statement, Brazil’s environment ministry said that the Amazon fund, which draws on donations from foreign governments, put 405 million reais ($79.4 million) toward firefighting at the state level under Lula’s current administration, which began in 2023.

The federal government sent about 380 firefighters to Roraima, the northern Amazon state that was hit the hardest by the fires, which were intensified by drought, the ministry said.

It did not respond to questions on cuts to Ibama’s firefighting budget. The agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Ibama agents have suspended field work since January amid tense negotiations with the federal government for better pay and working conditions.

Ascema has rejected the latest government offer and demanded larger salary rises after more than a decade of paltry increases and dwindling staff.

While the area burned is a record for the first four months of the year, it pales in comparison to blazes in the peak dry season from August to November, when an area that size can burn in a single month.

“The government needs to understand that without total engagement from environmental workers, the situation foreseen for this year is unprecedented catastrophe,” said Ascema President Cleberson Zavaski.

“Prevention efforts, such as raising awareness about ignitions, creating firebreaks in strategic areas, and conducting prescribed burns, depend on employing people with stable conditions,” said Manoela Machado, a fire researcher at the Woodwell Climate Research Center. “These measures will influence the severity of the fire crisis when the dry conditions allow fires to spread.”

Residents observe a flooded street at the city center of Sao Sebastiao do Cai, Rio Grande do Sul state, Brazil on May 2, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AFP

The death toll from floods and mudslides triggered by torrential storms in southern Brazil climbed to 39 on Friday, officials said, as they warned of worse to come.

As the rain kept beating down, rescuers in boats and planes searched for scores of people reported missing among the ruins of collapsed homes, bridges and roads.

Rising water levels in the state of Rio Grande do Sul were straining dams and threatening the metropolis of Porto Alegre with “unprecedented” flooding, authorities warned.

“Forget everything you’ve seen, it’s going to be much worse in the metropolitan region,” Governor Eduardo Leite said Friday as the streets of the state capital, with a population of some 1.5 million, started flooding after days of heavy downpours in the region.

The state’s civil defense department said at least 265 municipalities had suffered storm damage in Rio Grande do Sul since Monday, injuring 74 people and displacing more than 24,000 – a third of whom have been brought to shelters.

At least 68 people were missing, and more than 350,000 have experienced some form of property damage, according to the latest data.

And there was no end in sight, with officials reporting an “emergency situation, presenting a risk of collapse” at four dams in the state.

Disastrous cocktail

The level of the state’s main Guiaba river, meanwhile, was estimated to have risen 4.2-4.6 meters (about 13.7-15 feet), but could not be measured as the gauges have washed away, the mayor of Porto Alegre said.

As it kept rising, officials raced to reinforced flood protection.

Porto Alegre’s worst recorded flood was in 1941, when the river reached a level of 4.71 meters.

Elsewhere in the state, several cities and towns have been completely cut off from the world in what Governor Leite described as “the worst disaster in the history” of Rio Grande do Sul.

Many communities have been left without access to drinking water, telephone or internet services.

Tens of thousands have no electricity.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva visited the region Thursday, vowing “there will be no lack of human or material resources” in responding to the disaster, which he blamed on climate change.

The central government has sent aircraft, boats and more than 600 soldiers to help clear roads, distribute food, water and mattresses, and set up shelters.

School classes have been suspended state-wide.

“I feel very sorry for all those who live here… I feel pain in my heart,” Maria Luiza, a 51-year-old resident of Sao Sebastiao do Caí, some 40 miles (70 km) from Porto Alegre, told AFP.

In Capela de Santana, north of the state capital, Raul Metzel explained that his neighbors had to abandon their livestock.

“You don’t know if the water will continue to rise or what will happen to the animals, they may soon drown,” he said.

Climatologist Francisco Eliseu Aquino told AFP on Friday the devastating storms were the result of a “disastrous cocktail” of global warming and the El Nino weather phenomenon.

South America’s largest country has recently experienced a string of extreme weather events, including a cyclone in September that claimed at least 31 lives.

Aquino said the region’s particular geography meant it was often confronted by the effects of tropical and polar air masses colliding — but these events have “intensified due to climate change.”

And when they coincide with El Nino, a periodic weather system that warms the tropical Pacific, the atmosphere becomes more unstable, he said.

Extreme flooding hit the state in the last two years at “a level of recurrence not seen in 10,000 years,” said Aquino, who heads the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul’s geography department.

Brazil’s new climate change targets would be more ambitious than the United States, which has pledged to cut emissions by 50-52% by 2030.
| Photo Credit: AP

Brazil is expected to announce revised climate targets this week, as President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva strengthens a prior pledge made by his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, government officials with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Lula is expected to speak on Wednesday at a Climate Ambition Summit called by the United Nations secretary general, where “in principle” he would announce the revised target, one Brazilian official said.

The country will institute an annual cap of 1.32 gigatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions by 2025, equivalent to a 50% reduction from 2005, said a second Brazilian official, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media ahead of the announcement.

Brazil intends to cap 2030 emissions at 1.20 gigatonnes of greenhouse gas, a reduction of 53% compared to 2005, the source said. Brazil’s new climate change targets would be more ambitious than the United States, which has pledged to cut emissions by 50-52% by 2030, also compared to 2005.

The person said that capping the emissions in gigatonnes would bring clarity and put the new target on a par with Brazil’s original 2015 target before Bolsonaro laid out new targets.

Brazil’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to request for comment.

Lula dedicated a section of his speech to climate change on Tuesday at the United Nations General Assembly.

“The vulnerable populations of the Global South are most affected by the losses and damages caused by climate change,” Lula said.

Video footage showed the plane lying on a muddy dirt track with the front part of the aircraft in green foliage. Image for representation purpose only. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

A small passenger plane crashed in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest Saturday, killing all 14 people on board, Amazonas state Governor Wilson Lima announced.

“I deeply regret the death of the 12 passengers and two crew members who were victims of the plane crash in Barcelos on Saturday,” Mr. Lima said on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The Embraer PT-SOG aircraft had taken off from Manaus, the Amazonas state capital and the biggest city in the Amazon, and was attempting to land in heavy rain when it crashed, local media reported.

The passengers were Brazilian tourists on their way to fish, the reports said.

Video footage posted by the Globo television network showed the plane lying on a muddy dirt track with the front part of the aircraft in green foliage. A couple of dozen people are seen standing nearby holding umbrellas.

The Brazilian Air Force sent a team from Manaus to collect information and preserve any evidence that could be used for the investigation into the crash, an air force statement said.