Ricardo Salles on fires: “The scenario is the same as in 2020, but the pressure was greater before” | Blogs

Former Minister of the Environment of Jair Bolsonaro (PL), deputy Ricardo Salles (PL-SP) told CNN which is the same as what he faced as head of office in 2020, but the pressure from public opinion is different.

“Nothing is happening now that didn’t happen under our government, but in our time the pressure from public opinion was much greater. There was a much greater mobilization before. We had to mobilize a battalion,” said Salles.

Asked about the cause of the fires, the former minister said it was “part of the climate and part of human behavior”.

“It’s not the agricultural sector’s fault. This is stupidity. Nobody sets fire to their own asset,” she said.

Salles highlighted, however, that some farmers clean the pasture in the Pantanal region “erroneously” at this time, and not in March, when the “climate transition” occurs.

The former minister also stated that part of the fires could be attributed to small MST farmers in retaliation for landowners or to clear pasture.

The MST countered Salles.

“The fire is out of our perspective and only harms the soil. We plant vegetation precisely to protect the soil. The burned area can be used for livestock in agribusiness,” she told CNN Delweck Matheus, member of the MST coordination.

Bolsonaro’s former minister is pointed out by environmental activists as one of those responsible for the lack of land regularization in the Amazon, which favors fires.

“There is no land regularization. Today there are chainsaws and fires in the Amazon, which is leading to the savannization of the area for the expansion of livestock farming. It is a tragedy announced. The previous government opened the gate,” Mário Mantovani, executive director of the NGO SOS Mata Atlântica, told CNN.

Salles countered the activist.

“Not having regularized it was what got in the way. They called MP 907 the Land Grabbing MP”, said Salles.

The opposition to Bolsonaro at the time said that the approval of the MP would pave the way for the regularization of public areas invaded by land grabbers and environmental criminals and would facilitate the legalization of invasions where there are traditional, indigenous and quilombola communities.