Why does #Brazil's election of Jair #Bolsonaro matter so much?
Well, first up, people are going to die.
Brazil already has the highest rate of indigenous murders in the world, and Bolsonaro has repeatedly attacked them in hate speech sg.news.yahoo.com/fears-amazon-b…
Well, first up, people are going to die.
Brazil already has the highest rate of indigenous murders in the world, and Bolsonaro has repeatedly attacked them in hate speech sg.news.yahoo.com/fears-amazon-b…
. @Global_Witness said 57 land defenders were murdered in Brazil in 2017 and warned even before Bolsonaro that laws were getting less strict on protection tribune.com.pk/story/1765418/…
There are some pointing to Brazil's relatively robust institutions, suggesting Bolsonaro won't be able to legislate to push through some of his most damaging pledges. But he doesn't need to change the law to ruin the environment.
He has repeatedly attacked environmental protection agency IBAMA and plans to merge the agriculture and environment ministries, opening the door for agribusiness to trash the place. He can do all this right now, legally, with no parliamentary backing
The other thing to point out, gently, is if the Amazon goes we are goners too. Forest die back is a real danger - a feedback loop that contributes runaway global warming theguardian.com/environment/20…
It's also the world's biggest drugs repository. We've only so far studied around 0.5 percent of the Amazon's plants for medicinal purposes so far. There could be a plant that cures cancer, and Bolsonaro will build a cattle ranch over it amazonaid.org/medicinal-secr…
