Corporations and government PR on full display for the Amazon
Belem, Brazil
Every year that I attend a UN COP Climate Summit, I make a point of traversing the “Green Zone” to observe the high-tech, flashy, and spacious areas where multinational businesses and government corporations display their commitment to the climate and how they will build toward a “sustainable” planetary future.
The added twist this year provided special focus in the Green Zone on indigenous people living throughout the Amazon Rain Forest, which, at nearly 2.3 million square miles, comprises about one-third of the South American continent, with 60 percent of the forest within Brazil. An estimated 25 to 30 million people reside within the borders of the Amazon Rain Forest, most of whom live in the urban areas dotting the region. There are an estimated 400 indigenous groups that speak 300 different languages or dialects.
Population growth and development have led to deforestation of the Amazon Rain Forest in Brazil by approximately 20 percent since 1970, the pace of which slowed considerably by the 1990s. And what has this wrought? Ongoing poverty crammed cities due to a lack of economic development, including greater energy and mineral extraction.
Among the multinational companies to the rescue of the Amazon Rain Forest are General Electric and Toyota. GE Vernova, which is now spun off from GE, provides much of the equipment to operate the Itaipu Binacional hydropower dam on the Parana River on the border of Brazil and Paraguay. The facility produces the second most electrical power of any hydro dam in the world, at 14 gigawatts continuously. Like the Hoover Dam in the U.S., built in the 1930s, hydropower at these levels makes prosperity possible for millions of people who otherwise would be further impoverished.
Toyota, on the other hand, was all about displaying its charity to indigenous peoples, such that one would never know it’s an automobile manufacturer, mostly of gasoline-powered vehicles. No doubt UN bureaucrats appreciated its financial penance to reside in the Green Zone.
Other financial corporations displayed their good works, including the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) and Nobat.ai, the latter of which is an arm of the oil-rich fiefdom of the United Arab Emirates, which hosted COP28 in Dubai two years prior.
BNDES is a government finance agency of the Brazilian government and takes other nations’ contributions to capitalize the Amazon Fund. Funding is used to protect against further deforestation, including providing security personnel to police the Amazon, and support for farming methods in indigenous areas.
Nabat.ai runs an operation to offset the carbon footprint of its government and of large corporations by seeding trees, plants, and animal habitats throughout the UAE, particularly along the Persian Gulf, according to its Chief Product Officer, Taha Ghaznavi, with whom I spoke. Nabat was launched nearly one year ago and uses drones and robotics to conserve and restore habitats, including thousands of hectares of mangroves in the country. Impressive as this technology is, it’s premised on the vapid notion of attaining “net zero” carbon emissions, that is, UAE and corporate clients like oil giants emit carbon, then fund this initiative to “sequester” this trace emission.
Perhaps most interesting was the government of the Brazilian state of Amapa, which had at least a dozen staff touting its economy and seeking investors. Two of the state’s largest exports are lumber and Acai berries, according to Julianna Mara Farias Ubaiara. She also boasted that Amapa is home to Tumucumaque, Brazil’s largest national park with 15,000 square miles. This state also preserves the largest area of the Amazon Rain Forest in the nation.
Another vital part of Amapa’s economy, Ms. Ubaiara noted, was oil. Her mere mention of this maligned product at a climate summit about knocked me to the ground, and good for her. Amapa’s government evidently understands the necessities for a modernizing economy, including oil extraction, on and offshore, along with land and forest preservation, with no apologies.
On an especially sour note, under the banner of “DiploHouse,” a group of Arab men wearing “Stop Ecocide Genocide” t-shirts had vendor space to show their virulent hatred of Israel. Posters on the walls accused the Jewish state of atrocities during the war in Gaza and its alleged destruction of the environment, farmland, and livelihoods in “occupied territory.” Shame on the UN for allowing this extreme propaganda toward one of its own member states. Unfortunately, this was not the first example, as I observed a whole panel of anti-Jewish hate two years ago at COP28.
A couple of other observations of the Green Zone throughout the day included that very little English was spoken, in contrast to recent COP summits in the Middle East and Europe. That made it difficult to converse with a number of vendors who spoke only Portuguese or Spanish, absent translator help from Google.
Also, largely absent in the Green Zone was the display of solar and wind power, in contrast to recent climate summits. The Global Bio-fuels Alliance had a large space, along with GE hydropower capacity. There was more visibility of solar and wind power in the “Blue Zone,” notwithstanding their inefficiency and ineffectiveness, especially for the indigenous people throughout the Amazon region and still-developing nations of South America.