SENATOR CORKER LOOKS INTO CHALLENGES OF DEFORESTATION IN

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BRASILIA 000399 SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPARTMENT FOR H, OES/EGC, WHA/BSC, F E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: OREP SENV EAID EAGR KGHG BR SUBJECT: SENATOR CORKER LOOKS INTO CHALLENGES OF DEFORESTATION IN BRAZIL BRASILIA 00000399 001.2 OF 003 (U) THIS CABLE IS SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED AND NOT FOR INTERNET DISTRIBUTION. ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY. Senator Robert Corker visited the State of Amazonas on March 20-21 and learned about the extensive deforestation problem in Brazil and efforts to address it. Governor Eduardo Braga explained his state's innovative program to pay forest dwellers a monthly payment to protect the forest, and the Senator visited one of the sites participating in the program. In a meeting with a rancher (and NGO leader),he heard about the almost non-existent enforcement of environmental laws, which was leading to lawlessness. The Senator also heard from leading experts on the Amazon about the challenges of developing sustainable economic activities for the people living in the forests. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (SBU) On March 20-21, Senator Robert Corker visited the State of Amazonas to investigate the problem of deforestation in Brazil and efforts to control it. Brazil is a major emitter of greenhouse gases, principally due to this massive, ongoing clearing of the Amazon forest. Last year, a massive 11,000 square kilometers were cleared. The State of Amazonas, which is about the size of Alaska, contains about half of the remaining Amazon forest in Brazil. AMAZONAS STATE GOVERNOR BRAGA ¶3. (SBU) On March 20, Senator Corker met with the State of Amazonas Governor Eduardo Braga and his advisors. Braga stressed the success his administration had achieved in creating jobs in Manaus, the capital and largest city in the state. At the same time, the Governor stressed, success in accomplishing the goal of preventing deforestation would require providing more value to standing forests than cutting them down. Otherwise, the deforestation occurring elsewhere would soon overwhelm the State of Amazonas. In 2008, Braga's administration had created the Foundation Sustainable Amazonas (FAS),which provided small payments - about USD 20 per month - to families living in state reserves for providing ecoservices, i.e., protecting the forests. Braga has attracted outside funding for the FAS payment program, called the "Bolsa Floresta" or "Forest Subsidy." A large private Brazilian bank (Bradesco),Marriott and Coca-Cola have all made significant contributions to FAS. Braga emphasized that FAS and other programs based on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) were critical to preserving the Amazon. ¶4. (SBU) Braga commented that it was perverse that the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the Kyoto Protocol provided credits for reforestation of cleared lands, but nothing for the preservation of standing forests. This arrangement created incentives for those who had unwisely cleared their forests and excluded those who had been good stewards of the forests. Braga was seeking to correct the incentives through his own REDD-program, i.e., FAS. He noted that he had just two years left in office, and he expressed concern that the next governor would likely not be as determined to promote forest conservation. JUMA RESERVE PROJECT ¶5. (SBU) Senator Corker visited a FAS project at a village called Boa Frente in the Juma Reserve, which is a state protected area not far from a highway. The visit illustrated the efforts to improve the quality of life of the nearly 100 inhabitants through the Bolsa Floresta payments. Funded in large part from contributins by Marriott, the site also included a new schol, learning center, and community center. Villagers receive training in how to increase their income through sustainable forest projects, such as harvesting acai berries, brazil nuts, and manioc. In return for the support from FAS, the village leaders and villagers recognized that they needed to protect their surrounding forest. THE SYSTEM FOR PROTECTION OF THE AMAZON (SIPAM) ¶6. (SBU) The Brazilian System for Protection of the Amazon (SIPAM) Operations Center in Manaus opened its doors to Senator Corker. On March 20, Director Bruno da Gama Malheiro briefed the Senator on the elaborate air space and ground monitoring system in the Amazon, which has both national security (called SIVAM) and civilian environmental roles. The network includes three remote-sensing planes, five flying radars, and 200 monitoring stations. SIPAM's mission is to collect information that will support the authorities in planning and with sustainable development. This monitoring network identifies deforestation sites, illegal trafficking, and clandestine landing sites. SIPAM supplies the information collected to the Brazilian environment agency (IBAMA) and state and local authorities. In recent months, SIPAM has been making a concerted effort to observe on an hourly basis deforestation in the 36 BRASILIA 00000399 002.2 OF 003 municipalities in the Amazon that accounted for over half of Brazil's deforestation last year. He said this gives law enforcement authorities real time information on illegal activities in these hot spots. THE VIEW FROM THE GROUND - JOHN CAIN CARTER ¶7. (SBU) An American rancher, John Cain Carter, from the State of Goias, on the southern edge of the Amazon forest, provided the Senator with the view from the ground. At a March 20 meeting, Carter described frequent invasions of his ranch and that of his neighbors. Further, the invaders had burned down much of the forest on his land. He opined that many of the state and local authorities were in league with the invaders. The authorities did not come to protect his property despite repeated requests for assistance. Weak enforcement meant that almost all the ranchers and farmers in the region cleared their land with impunity, not caring about meeting the legal requirement to maintain 80 percent of the land as forests. Emphasizing that he is neither a scientist nor an environmentalist, Carter said that he was seeing significant changes in the weather and rain patterns caused by the massive deforestation of the Amazon. He was seeing far less rain, rains starting later in the year, and higher temperatures. Accordingly, Carter and his fellow ranchers and farmers are joining together to help address the problem of deforestation which is affecting them. They formed a group called Alianca da Terra (the Land Alliance),and this group works to convince producers to bring their properties into compliance with the forest reserve requirements and to develop markets for their legal products. Carter emphasized that the ranchers and farmers need to be at the center of solving this problem, rather than having programs being forced top down on them from the capital. AMAZON SCIENTISTS ¶8. (SBU) On March 21, several researchers briefed Senator Corker on the challenges regarding deforestation and climate change. Highlights from these meetings included: - Dr. Philip Fearnside of the National Institute for Amazon Research (INPA). He saw difficulties in trying to compare the value of carbon credits for conserving standing forests and those for reforesting previously cleared lands. In particular, it is hard to include a time value element accurately, he commented. Namely, how much value should be given each year for maintaining a standing forest. He thought the United Nations was trying to side-step the time value issue. Overall, Fearnside opined that if the sole goal is to reduce the world's greenhouse gas emissions (without regard to other important goals, such as energy independence),the most effective way would be to allow 100% of a country's emissions reductions targets to be available for credits anywhere in the world. He emphasized that a carbon credit system would need to have accurate and reliable information about the amounts of carbon emissions reduced. Otherwise, the system could be gamed and real reductions in emissions might not accrue. - Dr. Edson Barcelos of the Institute for Development in the Amazon (IDAM). He argued that it is critical to develop for the rural population in the Amazon economic activities that are sustainable and do not require clearing the forest. He said that his group IDAM was working on developing activities for those living in the Amazon, such as fish farming, cultivating acai, and marketing nuts and other forest products. The goal is to give value to a standing forest. - Dr. Charles Clement of INPA. While agreeing that reducing deforestation depended on increasing the value of the standing forest, Clement thought that current programs were unlikely to work. He thought that the demand for forest products was limited and urging forest residents to increase production would lead to excess supply and lower prices. Also, most of those living in the forest were too far from markets to become significant suppliers. On the other hand, the FAS program of monthly payments was just welfare and monthly amounts would have to be increased to meet growing expectations and demands of forest dwellers. The underlying problem, according to Clement, is that there is both an increasing population and growing demand for goods per person in the Amazon. Right now, the only way to meet this rising demand is through cutting down the forest. Clement suggested one of the best ways to deal with this growing demand and protect the forest is increasing rural education. He saw a strong link between greater education and leaving the forest for the city. Thus, more education would lead to draining young people from the rural areas. - Dr. Mario Cohn Haft of INPA - The Amazon Forest is "the Michael Jordan of the world's forests." It is a magnitude richer in biodiversity than any other. For example, the Amazon is home to BRASILIA 00000399 003.2 OF 003 over 3,000 of the world's known 10,000 bird species. Given this rich biodiversity, independent of climate change benefits, the Amazon Forest merits preserving, he commented. ¶9. (SBU) This cable was cleared with CODEL Corker. SOBEL