Brazil’s Amazon rainforest saw its largest fires on record in the first four months of the year, with the environmental workers’ union on Monday partly blaming lower government spending on firefighting.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has used his international reputation to protect the Amazon rainforest and restore Brazil as a leader in climate policy.
The Amazon, the largest rainforest in the world, is crucial to combating catastrophic global warming because of the enormous amount of greenhouse gases it absorbs.
A record drought in the Amazon rainforest region, caused by the El Nino climate phenomenon and global warming, has helped dry conditions fuel fires this year.
More than 12,000 square kilometers of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest burned between January and April, the most in more than two decades of data, according to Brazilian space research agency Inpe. That is an area larger than Qatar, or almost as large as the American state of Connecticut.
Fires in the Amazon generally do not occur naturally, but are started by people, often trying to clear land for agriculture.
Cuts in firefighting are also partly to blame, environmental union Ascema said in a statement. They complained that the budget for environmental agency Ibama to fight fires is 24% lower this year than in 2023.
In a statement, Brazil’s environment ministry said the Amazon fund, which relies on donations from foreign governments, has spent 405 million reais ($79.4 million) on state-level firefighting under Lula’s current government, which started in 2023.
The federal government sent about 380 firefighters to Roraima, the northern Amazon state hardest hit by the fires, which were worsened by drought, the ministry said.
There was no response to questions about cuts to Ibama’s firefighting budget. The agency did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Ibama agents have suspended field work since January amid tense negotiations with the federal government over better wages and working conditions.
Ascema has rejected the latest government offer and demanded bigger salary increases after more than a decade of meager pay increases and workforce cuts.
While the area burned is a record for the first four months of the year, it pales in comparison to fires in the peak dry season of August to November, when an area of that size can burn in a single month.
“The government must understand that without the total involvement of environmental workers, the situation expected this year will be an unprecedented catastrophe,” said Ascema President Cleberson Zavaski.
“Prevention efforts, such as raising awareness of ignitions, creating fire breaks in strategic areas and conducting prescribed burns, depend on employing people with stable conditions,” said Manoela Machado, a fire researcher at the Woodwell Climate Research Center. “These measures will impact the severity of the fire crisis when dry conditions allow fires to spread.”
