Bill To Eliminate Most Agrochemical Oversight The Latest In Bolsonaro's "Agenda Of Death"
Brazil’s lower house of congress has overwhelmingly approved a bill that would loosen regulations for the use of pesticides, raising concerns that approval in the Senate would unleash further environmental damage in one of the world’s largest agricultural powerhouses. The Safer Food Bill is promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture as a way to “modernize the registration process of pesticides,” allowing producers to be more competitive and lowering food prices for consumers. If approved by the Senate, it would supersede a 1989 law governing the use of agrochemicals and change the rules of their production, sale and distribution.
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The Safer Food Bill is one of 45 in Congress’s docket of priority legislation this year, collectively nicknamed the “Death Package” or “Destruction Package” by opposition groups. Critics say it’s evidence of the anti-environmental and anti-Indigenous agenda being urgently pursued by Bolsonaro, who has made clear his support of the agribusiness sector and actively sought to dismantle environmental protections since taking office at the start of 2019. His actions during this time have included implementing severe budget and personnel cuts in environmental agencies and refusing to punish environmental crimes.
“Bolsonaro’s anti-environmental agenda was obvious even before these new proposals,” Haroldo Heleno, a regional coordinator with the Indigenist Missionary Council (CIMI), an advocacy group affiliated with the Catholic Church, told Mongabay by phone. “[His agenda] has always been in favor of the miners and the timber companies.” The package of priority legislation for 2022 features bills that push for development objectives at the expense of the environment and Indigenous rights. The Indigenous Land Timeframe Bill, for example, would deny Indigenous communities from obtaining legal recognition of their traditional lands if they weren’t already established in the area before Oct. 5, 1988, the date Brazil’s current Constitution was promulgated.
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Another bill relaxes environmental licensing requirements, exempting projects such as hydroelectric dams, water treatment, and energy distribution. Activists say this will fuel serious human rights violations and environmental degradation. Yet another piece of legislation, the Land Regularization Bill, dubbed the “Land Grabbing Bill,” has been criticized for weakening controls over the occupation of public lands, opening the way for amnesty for land grabbers and associated environmental violators. Under current laws, experts say, land grabbing is already associated with increased deforestation and deliberate fires, which critics say will escalate if the new bill is passed.
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https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/brazil-agrochemical-bill-nears-passage-in-bolsonaros-agenda-of-death/