Brazil, Germany join efforts for sustainable production in Amazon

Plans will include a qualification index for local production chains

Published on 10/12/2019 - 11:40 By Gilberto Costa - Brasília

Brazil’s Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, and Supply is set to create the Socio-Environmental Adequacy Index on the production chains of meat, soybeans, and wood in the states of Amazonas, Mato Grosso, Pará, Rondônia, and Tocantins.

The initiative is part of a technical cooperation project between Brazil and Germany for 2020–2024 and aims to step up efforts to preserve the Amazon Rainforest.

The index will have the National Rural Environmental Registration System—CAR, included in the Brazilian Forest Code—as its data base, along with the guidelines on controlling the circulation of beef cattle, plus information on surveillance efforts against slave-live working conditions.

Signed in Brasília on Monday (Dec. 9), the cooperation agreement includes a 25.5 million euro donation from Germany and 12 million euro from the Brazilian government.

The plans, the ministry reported, “seek to create tools to monitor the socio-environmental situation of these production chains, increase the added value of goods across sectors with good sustainability rates, and provide technical and management assistance for producers with low sustainability rates.”

“Whoever’s doing well will have a chance to gather momentum and boost both quality and income. Those with indicators below acceptable levels will have to have the state’s hand and assistance to cross that threshold and become productive,” Minister Tereza Cristina noted.

New meat

The project starts off with a focus on meat production in the states of the so-called Amazônia Legal, a area of over 5 million km² reaching states in the North (Acre, Amapá, Pará, Amazonas, Rondônia, and Roraima) and a portion of the states of Mato Grosso, Tocantins, and Maranhão.

“This cooperation deal is particularly important for cattle ranching. I want to call it ‘new meat,’” Tereza Cristina said. The initiative, she said, should benefit producers and further open the market.

Germany's Ambassador to Brazil Georg Witschel recognized that the free trade deal with Mercosur will increase meat exports from Brazil to the European Union. This exchange, he argued, depends on compliance with the rules set forth in the Paris Agreement (2015), which, among other things, outlines efforts for the protection against climate change.

“We foster the ministry’s efforts to design technological solutions and promote excellence in agricultural extension as a goal towards improving the sustainability in agricultural production. We’re convinced that this will provide the market with a better stance and bring about better opportunities for producers in Brazil, in line with the goals for the preservation of natural resources and the Amazon rainforest,” the diplomat stated.

Translation: Fabrício Ferreira -  Edition: Fábio Massalli / Nira Foster

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