Sawt Falasteen - Brazil's Lula, man on a mission at COP28: take rich world to task

Having largely delivered on his promise to curb the destruction of the crucial Amazon rainforest, now-President Lula heads to this year's edition of the talks on a mission: sell ambitious new plans to protect the world's forests, and get rich countries to do more in the climate fight.

Since Lula, 78, took office for a third time in January, Brazil has halved deforestation in its giant share of the Amazon versus last year -- a sea change from the surge in clear-cutting that happened under Lula's far-right predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022).

Brazil believes that progress, plus its use of 89-percent clean electricity, gives it leverage heading into the COP28 talks in Dubai, which open Thursday.

The Latin American giant is going to the talks "with our heads held high," planning to "make more demands than we face," said respected Environment Minister Marina Silva.

She said Brazil would push for rich nations to finally make good on their unfulfilled promises to provide climate funding for the most vulnerable countries, and to "take the foot off the accelerator of fossil fuels."

Silva said Lula, who has vowed to eliminate illegal deforestation by 2030, would also propose the creation of a fund where wealthy nations pay tropical forest countries for every hectare of preserved forest land, whose carbon-absorbing capacity is a key resource against global warming.

- Not without concerns -

But there are also blemishes on Brazil's recent environmental record.

In the Cerrado, a key tropical savanna below the Amazon, deforestation under Lula has leapt by 34 percent from the same period last year, according to satellite monitoring.

Meanwhile, the Talanoa Institute, a climate policy group, said in a recent report that Brazil is unlikely to achieve its target under the Paris climate accord to cut its CO2 emissions by 480 million tonnes by 2025.

Incidentally, that is the same year Brazil is due to host the UN climate talks.

Lula has also faced criticism over plans by state-run oil company Petrobras to drill for oil at the mouth of the Amazon river.

Still, the veteran leftist heads to Dubai with a slate of climate initiatives.

In addition to the 80-country tropical forest plan, he is set to announce a massive program to recover degraded farmland in Brazil, enabling the agricultural powerhouse to expand its total farmland from 65 million to 105 million hectares without razing any more forest.

The government plans to invest around $120 billion over a decade in the plan.

- G20 presidency -

Lula's arrival at COP28 Friday will coincide with Brazil taking over the rotating presidency of the G20 -- where his government said it also planned to make climate change a central issue.

Global warming is driving "severe economic and social problems," said Mauricio Lyrio, Brazil's chief negotiator at the club of the world's 20 biggest economies.

Brazil, which has been hit by extreme weather ranging from torrential rains to drought this year, plans to pressure wealthy nations to invest more in combating climate change and reducing emissions, said Lyrio.

"Financing is fundamental. Countries need to be spending more," he said.

Brazil also plans to use its year-long G20 presidency to focus on fighting poverty and launch a "global alliance against hunger."

It would be modeled on a Lula trademark -- the ambitious programs that helped lift 30 million Brazilians from poverty during his first two presidential terms (2003-2010).

S.Barghouti--SF-PST