(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Before Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro delivered the opening speech at the United Nations 74th General Assembly on Tuesday, Brazilians were wondering which Bolsonaro would prevail. Would they get the familiar right-wing barker who’s never left the campaign stump? Or would he be the statesman’s quick study who understands that Latin America’s economy of record needs politesse and international partners to grow and prosper?
Silly questions. After nearly nine months in office, Bolsonaro is still the provocateur-in-chief, for whom no venue is too august to forego a screed or vent an ideological conceit. Never mind that behind every Brazilian problem he sees Cubans, Venezuelans, human rights fellow travelers and other assorted Cold War villains.
The destruction of the Amazon rain forest, which scientists fear could push the world’s biggest tropical forest to a tipping point? “Sensationalist attacks spread by international media,” Bolsonaro said. Threats to indigenous lands? Falsehoods told by nongovernmental organizations shilling for foreigners with neo-colonial designs on Brazil’s treasures. Police violence? “Our military police are the criminal world’s choice targets.” True enough, but he left out the bits about the rising numbers of killings by cops, and that 75% of police killed in 2017 and 2018 were off duty, most of them moonlighting as hired security guards.
Bolsonaro and his closest advisers may not be convinced of the threat of global warming. But they ought to be concerned about the perils of political climate change. Sure, Bolsonaro eventually caved to the clamor over the burning Amazon and dispatched army troops to fight fires, but only after downplaying the emergency, sacking the head of the space institute which monitors the rain forest and blaming the blazes on partisan saboteurs.
Such equivocation badly underestimated the degree to which the green agenda matters. Just last week, young people around the world hit the streets in defense of the environment, a savvy and politically wired demographic for whom Greta Thunberg is the disrupter of choice.
Few of Bolsonaro’s global peers are likely to be moved by the indigenous collar he sported in his Manhattan hotel, or fooled by the indigenous YouTuber he flew in to join the Brazilian delegation like some kind of Amazonian Joe the Plumber. “Bringing an Indian along doesn’t mean he has the backing of indigenous people. Because he doesn’t,” protested Sonia Guajajara, one of the Brazilian indigenous leaders who has slammed Bolsonaro’s policies.
What’s clear from Bolsonaro’s U.N. harangue is how quickly his mandate is aging. The former Brazilian military man soared to the national stage as a fresh face whose unvarnished rhetoric and mastery of Facebook and Twitter enabled him to rack up political points with common Brazilians. Now he has collided with the world’s new demographic, who could care little about the culture wars Bolsonaro wages and everything about how polarized politics and ideological folly are compromising the planet.
The shame is, Brazil has environmental assets that ought to be touted and monetized. But that calls for diplomacy, not chest-thumping. The country pioneered clean-burning fuel distilled from sugar cane. Unlike in Europe or the U.S., where coal or gas feeds electrical generation, Brazil’s power grid draws mainly on hydroelectric power. Hence, Brazil’s emerging fleet of electrical vehicles can plug into one of the cleanest grids on earth.
Brazil’s recent record in the rain forest also needs shouting out. By reducing forest destruction between 2005 and 2013, Brazil avoided spewing more than 7 billion tons of climate-baking carbon into the air. Another leader might have acknowledged the recent spike in forest-cutting and fires and then appealed for help, noting that Brazil has been compensated for only a fraction (3%) of those averted greenhouse gas emissions. Instead, Bolsonaro demonized the internationally sponsored Amazon Fund for mitigating climate change, thereby chasing away deep-pocketed sponsors Norway and Germany.
This is not just a missed political opportunity. It’s self-immolation. While Bolsonaro played the Amazon sovereignty card and scolded green meddlers, his agriculture minister was on a mission to convince international customers that Brazil can harvest without trampling the land.
Moreover, Bolsonaro’s bellicose speech only encourages the anti-globalism among Brasilia’s inner circle and now threatens Brazil’s wider interests. Last week, 230 investment funds, controlling some $16.2 trillion, issued a public statement recognizing “the crucial role tropical forests play” in fighting climate change and “ensuring ecosystem services.” The funds cautioned companies about doing business with suppliers from environmentally compromised regions of the Amazon basin.
That augurs another kind of potential disaster for a country still struggling to recover from recession: an economic conflagration that razes its money and reputation.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Gibney at jgibney5@bloomberg.net
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Mac Margolis is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Latin and South America. He was a reporter for Newsweek and is the author of “The Last New World: The Conquest of the Amazon Frontier.”
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