Thread by @SmokeSignalBR

Think of pesticides being dropped from airplanes on children to force rural communities off their land.

This is not the description of a dystopian reality in which some evil agribusiness model rules. It is Brazil 2021.

Come with us to learn more: 🧵
#ClimateCrisis #Pesticides

In the first thread of this series, we explained a little of the context that made Brazil the biggest consumer of highly hazardous pesticides (HHP) in the World:

https://twitter.com/SmokeSignalBR/status/1413146626776920071?s=20

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Back to planes, the episode took place in May, in Araçá, Maranhão state. According to a complaint investigated by @reporterb the substances were dumped as a chemical weapon by a soy farmer who borders the community to expel families from their land. +

reporterbrasil.org.br/2021/05/agroto…

The area is part of the Cerrado– a biome threatened by the advance of agribusiness– as we talked about here last week👇
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https://twitter.com/SmokeSignalBR/status/1405655315442552834?s=20

Several reports of planes and poison have been recorded for years in Brazil. The list of social and environmental impacts is long:

💦Contaminated water + soil
🐝Disrupted ecosystems
🌱Destruction of neighboring crops
☠️Intoxication of workers and consumers via the food chain

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Encouraged by multinationals, agricultural conglomerates and the State itself, chemical products have been used as a war tactic with the objective of devastating traditional lands, making them unproductive, giving way to large estates commodity exporters. +

Interestingly, several HHPs sold in Brazil are prohibited for use in their countries of origin. One example is the herbicide paraquat, banned in Switzerland and throughout Europe since 2007, is associated with cases of cancer, Parkinson, pulmonary fibrosis and genetic mutations.+

@UE + @PublicEyeSuisse found that the intensity of use of HHPs seen in Brazil is replicated in other low & middle income nations. While HHPs accounted on average for just 27% of sales to high income nations, that share rose to 45% in low income countries.
news.mongabay.com/2020/03/brazil…

Reality is that the scale of the use of HHPs in Brazil is a cog in the machine for land concentration and land grabbing from peasants, indigenous peoples and traditional communities that underlines the country's agrarian scene.

Next: Where does Bolsonaro stand on HHPs?