The Political Arc of Deforestation

In January 2020, The Agribusiness Watch (De Olho nos Ruralistas) released its major journalistic endeavour: a systematization of Ibama’s database of environmental fines imposed in the past 25 years. From the 284,235 infractions we found hundreds of politicians, some of whom were portrayed in 2016 in a series of articles on the candidates linked to agribusiness and logging or prosecuted for environmental crimes who were running for mayoral positions in the Amazon region. Some of those candidates were elected and are running for a second term. Others weren’t elected and are seeking office in new elections in 2020.

The Political Arc of Deforestation combined the two perspectives to track the political fingerprints behind the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. What was the behavior of those mayors during the Covid-19 pandemic? Did they comply with president Jair Bolsonaro’s vision towards Indigenous peoples and the environment? How are they acting to cope with wildfires in their regions? The project investigated who the politicians were that profited from deforestation at the local level and their connections with agribusiness associations and their lobby groups. Furthermore, The Political Arc of Deforestation questioned how politicians acquired their lands: was it via normal means, or are these rural properties somehow linked to the expulsion of Indigenous peoples, Quilombolas and other traditional communities?

All the stories published as part of the project are linked below in their original Portuguese versions.

El País Brasil

• Candidates accumulate public land and violent practices in the countryside (Nov. 12, 2020)
• Land reform will end up in the hands of politicians (Nov. 12, 2020)
• Politicians advance with land and fines in municipalities that deforest most (Nov. 12, 2020)

The Agribusiness Watch

• One thousand mayoral candidates declare 308,000 head of cattle (Oct. 28, 2020)
• Agribusiness Watch debuts election coverage with x-ray of pastoralists (Oct. 29, 2020)
• Candidates with fines and list of charges advance in the cattle capital of Pará (Oct. 29, 2020)
• Names on the "dirty list" of slave labor dispute city halls in eight municipalities in the Amazon (Nov. 5, 2020)
• Accused of polluting Pantanal's springs, "Pig King" runs for Senate in Mato Grosso (Nov. 7, 2020)
• Accused of shackling, deforestation and trafficking, mayor is a relay of Globo in Itaituba (PA) (Nov. 8, 2020)
• Violent, bolsonarist and arms dealers: two candidates in the bucolic Caldas Novas (GO) (Nov. 11, 2020)
• In Novo Progresso (PA), two candidates own land in the Jamanxim National Forest (Nov. 12, 2020)
• Fines for deforestation dispute city hall in Apuí (AM), frontier of devastation in Transamazon (Nov. 12, 2020)
• Accused of corruption, former advisor to Katia Abreu tries to return to the city hall in Goiatins (TO) (Nov. 13, 2020)
• Mayor in the interior of SP declared R$ 82 million in farms investigated in Mato Grosso (Nov. 13, 2020)
• Candidate in Gaúcha do Norte (MT), leader of soybean producers accumulates R$ 20 million in fines for deforestation (Nov. 13, 2020)
• From inside and outside the Amazon, mayoral candidates from all over the country have 677 thousand hectares in the region (Nov. 13, 2020)
• Farmer with assets of R$ 46 million, PSL candidate received emergency aid in Pará (Nov. 13, 2020)
• Candidates for mayor of other states have 162 thousand hectares in Legal Amazon (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Candidate for mayor in Chapada dos Guimarães buys land for R$ 10 thousand (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Dispute in Lucas do Rio Verde, "capital of the agro-industry", mobilizes leading names in Mato Grosso politics (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Member of family of deforesters in the Amazon suggests Secretariat of Environment in Minas Gerais (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Of the 215 mayoral candidates in Rondonia, 70 declare themselves farmers (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Voting in Mato Grosso may give a majority to the ruralist benches in the Senate (Nov. 14, 2020)
• Timber to the polls: the logging candidates in the Amazon (Nov. 15, 2020)
• Accused of shackling, deforestation and other crimes are elected to city halls in southern Pará (Nov. 17, 2020)
• Member of the Amazon Deforestation Clan is elected mayor in Minas Gerais (Nov. 18, 2020)