Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has sharply reduced deforestation in the Amazon and taken steps to strengthen the protection of Indigenous communities, reinforcing his environmental standing as the country prepares to host the COP30 United Nations climate summit next month.
However, the veteran leftist leader continues to face fierce resistance from Brazil’s powerful agribusiness lobby in Congress, which has consistently sought to weaken environmental regulations. At the same time, Lula has angered environmentalists by supporting expanded oil exploration, with state-run energy giant Petrobras recently receiving a licence to conduct exploratory drilling near the mouth of the Amazon River.
Experts, however, credit him with several key achievements.
Brazil’s Climate Comeback –
The 80-year-old Lula returned to power after years of unchecked deforestation under his climate-sceptic predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro.
“Brazil is back,” Lula proclaimed at COP27 in Egypt shortly after his re-election, where he was greeted with a hero’s welcome. He pledged to protect the Amazon rainforest — home to billions of carbon-absorbing trees crucial in the fight against global warming.
Lula announced that COP30 would be hosted in the Amazon itself, giving world leaders the opportunity to witness first-hand one of the planet’s most biodiverse regions.
He also reappointed Marina Silva as environment minister — a figure credited with drastically cutting deforestation during Lula’s first presidency. Though the two have clashed in the past over balancing development with conservation, they have now joined forces to rebuild Brazil’s environmental institutions.
Lula also revived the Amazon Fund, an international financial mechanism for rainforest protection that had been suspended during Bolsonaro’s tenure.
A government report released Monday revealed Brazil recorded its largest annual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in 15 years, largely due to falling deforestation rates.
Slowing Forest Loss –
Lula has pledged to eliminate deforestation entirely by 2030.
In Bolsonaro’s final year in office in 2022, forest destruction reached more than 10,000 square kilometres — an area roughly equivalent to the size of Lebanon.
Last week, the government announced that deforestation had fallen for the fourth consecutive year, with 5,796 square kilometres of native vegetation lost between August 2024 and July 2025.
João Paulo Capobianco, the environment ministry’s executive secretary, noted that if not for one of the country’s worst wildfire seasons in 2024, Brazil might have achieved its lowest deforestation rate on record.
The fires, often triggered by agricultural activities, spiralled out of control amid a severe drought linked to climate change.
Deforestation has also slowed in other ecologically sensitive biomes, such as the Cerrado — a vast tropical savannah in central Brazil.
Protecting Indigenous Lands –
Indigenous territories remain a crucial buffer against Amazon deforestation.
Lula created a dedicated Ministry for Indigenous Peoples and has officially recognised 16 new Indigenous reserves during his third term — reversing a near-complete freeze on such designations under previous administrations.
Marcio Astrini of the Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental NGOs, highlighted the importance of these measures: “A new government could cut climate policy funding, but it cannot undo legally protected Indigenous territories.”
Government agencies have also expelled illegal occupants from over 180,000 square kilometres of Indigenous lands — an area just smaller than Uruguay — according to the Indigenous affairs agency, Funai.
Local communities, officials report, have regained control of their territories, resuming traditional practices such as hunting and farming.
Financing Forest Protection –
The Brazilian government has introduced a new global initiative aimed at financing the preservation of endangered forests.
“We want to approve the Tropical Forest Forever Fund (TFFF), which will act as an investment vehicle. Brazil has already contributed US$1 billion, and it will support nations that keep their forests standing,” Lula told AFP and other media outlets in an interview on Tuesday.
Officials envision the TFFF as a fund exceeding US$100 billion, combining both public and private investments to promote large-scale forest conservation across the tropics.