New Brazil development law risks the deforestation of Amazon

A new law in Brazil can cause “significant damage to the environment and human rights violations” and represents a “Return for decades” protection in Brazil, also for the Amazon, has told a UN expert BBC News.

Plans to speed up approvals for development projects were criticized by Astrid Puentes Riaño, a special UN reportor, while the country is preparing for organizing the COP30 Climate Summit this year.

The legislators have adopted plans to simplify environmental permits for infrastructure, including roads, dams, energy and mines this month, although the president has not formally approved the bill.

Critics have called it the “destruction account” and say that it can lead to abuse and deforestation for the environment.

Proponents say that a new national license regime would simplify the long and complex process with which companies are confronted to prove authorities that planned developments do not cause unacceptable environmental damage.

According to the changes, some developers would be able to explain their impact of the environment themselves through an online form for projects that are considered smaller – a movement that supporters say that bureaucracy would reduce, but critics believe that there is great concern.

Mrs. Riaño told the BBC that she feared that the lighter regulations would “apply to some mining projects” and will “influence the Amazon region”.

She also said that it was “very worried” about plans for the automatic extension of the licenses of some projects where no major changes have occurred, saying: “This will prevent environmental impact assessments from being carried out on these projects. Some projects include mining projects or infrastructure projects where a full assessment is required.

“It will also cause deforestation. Changes or continuations of projects can mean deforestation in the Amazon without a correct assessment.”

A lot of deforestation and explanation in the Amazon is powered by agriculture and mining, sometimes illegally – but Mrs. Riaño said the bill “is going backwards” about attempts to prevent that.

Her intervention comes two months after new analysis was published Showing huge parts of the Amazon were destroyed in 2024With forest fires fed by drought that contribute to deforestation voltage made by humans.

According to the new law, environmental agencies would have 12 months – extended to 24 – to make a decision about admitting a license for strategic projects. If that deadline was missed, a license can be granted automatically.

Proponents say that this would provide companies with certainty by preventing delays that projects have plagued projects, including hydroelectric dams for clean energy or railway lines to transport grain.

Mrs. Riaño said that she understood the need for more efficient systems, but reviews must be “extensive” and “based on science”.

The law would also be the required relaxed to consult native or traditional Quilombola communities – descendants of Afro -Brazilian slaves – in some situations, unless they are hit immediately.

UN experts expressed their concern that accelerated assessments can remove some participation and influence human rights.

Proponents of the bill say that it will encourage economic development, including for renewable energy projects, which are held to grow the economy and to lower the costs for companies and the state.

But critics fear that the weakening of environmental protection could increase the risk of environmental disasters and violate indigenous rights.

In particular, UN experts claim that it could contradict the constitutional rights that can guarantee the right to an ecologically balanced environment – which means that legal challenges can be for us.

The Senate and the representatives of the representatives have approved the bill and it is now awaiting presidential approval.

President Lula da Silva has until 8 August to decide whether the new law is approved or veto.

The Minister of Brazil and the Minister of Climate Change, Marina Silva, has strongly opposed the bill and condemned it as a “bladder” for environmental protection.

But in the past she is at odds with the president on other issues, including proposals to explore oil drilling in the Amazon Basin.

Even if the president does the fat, there is a chance that the conservative congress could try to destroy.

The Brazil climate observatory has mentioned the bill the “greatest setback of the environment” since the military dictatorship of Brazil, in which the construction of roads and agricultural expansion led to increased deforestation of Amazon and the relocation of many indigenous people.

Mrs. Riaño said that scientists in Brazil estimate that the bill “will increase protection for more than 18 million hectares in the country, the size of Uruguay,” adding “the consequences are huge”.