Brazil’s Congress is likely to approve what experts describe as the country’s most significant environmental setback since 1988 when the Constitution was enacted. Bill 2159/2021, which changes several rules of the environmental licensing framework, was approved by the Senate on May 21, six months before Brazil hosts the COP30 climate summit in the Amazonian city of Belém. The bill was heavily criticized by environmental organizations and the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change — and celebrated by the powerful conservative forces of the Brazilian Congress. Experts argued that many of the bill’s provisions are unconstitutional. Nevertheless, in the following days, it should easily pass its final vote in the Chamber of Deputies, controlled by the agribusiness, mining and energy caucus. “Brazil, as president of the COP, cannot demonstrate to the whole world that it is going backwards in terms of caring for the environment by attacking its main environmental law,” representative Nilto Tatto, the environmental caucus coordinator in the Chamber of Deputies, told Mongabay. “We will long remember the day when the main damage prevention tool of the National Environmental Policy was completely weakened,” Suely Araújo, public policy coordinator at the civil society coalition Climate Observatory, stated on the organization’s website. According to the current legislation, an environmental license is mandatory for all enterprises that use natural resources and may cause damage to the environment or local communities. The entrepreneur has to conduct studies to assess the project’s eventual impacts and propose mitigation measures. It is up to environmental experts…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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