September 12 () –
Brazil’s Agriculture Minister Carlos Fávaro met with his Spanish counterpart Luis Planas on Wednesday to ask Madrid to support Brasilia’s request to the European Union to suspend its anti-deforestation law, which will force Brazilian producers exporting soybeans, meat, wood, rubber, coffee, cocoa and palm oil to comply with certain verification processes to ensure that these products do not come from areas with deforestation.
Fávaro stressed that Brazil has 90 million hectares of degraded grasslands, of which 40 million are “highly viable for food production,” which is why “there is no need to advance into forests to intensify production,” according to a statement from the Brazilian ministry.
During his meeting, held within the framework of bilateral meetings between ministers of the participating countries of the G20 Working Group on Agriculture, the Brazilian minister said he was “monitoring the situation and the struggles of European and Spanish producers to remain competitive in the face of restrictions imposed by climate change.”
Shortly before, Fávaro had held a meeting with the European Commissioner for Agriculture, Januz Wojciechowski, to whom he delivered a letter requesting the aforementioned suspension of the deforestation law for Brazil.
The Latin American country considers that its Forest Code is already one of the strictest in the world and that, since the current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, came to power, the fight against deforestation has become one of the “priority policies.”
Regarding degraded grasslands, the Brazilian minister has asked for EU help to give “continuity” to its commitment to zero deforestation by 2030, for which he has asked for the review of some measures that penalize “small and medium-sized producers in the process of development.”
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