The Future of Amazonia in Brazil. Marcílio de Freitas
is also a commitment and a civic debt of the national state to its original populations that have bequeathed us this fantastic physical and cultural heritage.
The break with important international scientific and technological collaborations associated with several Brazilian research programs towards better understanding of Amazonian ecosystems functioning and use is another of the Brazilian government’s mistakes. The destructive impact of this political action will affect several national institutions and generations of young Brazilians. Once again, political barbarism has triumphed over wisdom. Concentrated and long-term research, sophisticated studies, important social and economic projects applied to region, specialized technical training programs, and collaborations of a universal nature, among others, are in the process of extinction. A particular example is the destruction of the Amazon Fund Program, as presented in Chapter 7. Brazil still does not have enough science and technology for the full development of Amazonia in sustainable patterns. The integration and sustainable development of Pan-American Amazonia require alliances with traditional populations and international collaboration in knowledge from various fields.
The scientific and technological education of the 163 indigenous peoples from Brazilian Amazonia is another challenge. The organization of their academic curriculum requires the following innovations: reaffirmation of the education of indigenous teachers committed to science education integrated to the complexity of the region; an interdisciplinary pedagogical project emphasizing the indigenous teachers’ participation in teaching the subjects of this program; incorporation of themes touching on philosophy, the natural sciences, and the social sciences; inclusion of approaches and technical innovations that enable an interface of Western science and traditional knowledge; formation of networks promoting their scientific inclusion; formation of vocational technology platforms; and the access of the ←10 | 11→students to contemporary educational issues, strengthening their cultural formation and confrontation with predatory capitalism.
Teacher training programs for the indigenous peoples with a view to making Amazonia sustainable should be guided by the following thematic axes: mathematization and geometrization of nature’s processes; history and philosophy of science and indigenous education; research methodology in science education for indigenous teachers; psychopedagogical models applied to science education for indigenous teachers; instrumentalization for the training of indigenous teachers in science education; training of indigenous teachers in the models of sustainable development; indigenous education, communication, and contemporaneity; and engineering for the rainforest, health technicians, among other less important topics (Freitas and Pires, 2012). The Indigenous University of Amazonia is still a distant reality. This institution would generate many innovations in public policies and sustainable development of the region and the world. Its implementation is also a challenge to the region’s leaders.
How to develop Amazonia? This is a key issue both regionally and nationally. The sustainable development of Amazonia requires a set of operational initiatives among which we highlight: the building of a national political consensus; heavy investments in research, innovation, and development; increased support of the regional research and technology institutions; guide the basic science and tropical technological innovations to regional public policies; induce new tropical technologies; development of new differentiated industrial and fiscal policies; appropriate infrastructure and logistics; new regulatory framework for sustainable ecological and economic zoning; participant planning including all social and economic actors; and consolidation of national and international scientific partnerships. Sustainable development inserts new elements into Amazonia’s future.
In contrast, the federal government’s incentive of the possession and illegal use of indigenous lands by prospectors and loggers, and its threat to revise consolidated indigenous rights are another perverse legacy from the new president of Brazil. The growing expansion of agribusiness in Amazonia and the recent authorization by the Brazilian government of 51 different types of highly toxic pesticides also constitute threats to its indigenous peoples. Agribusiness continues to advance through Amazonia, creating poverty for its populations, deforesting and contaminating its biomes.
Without exception, all of the major projects that have been proposed for Amazonia are guided by predatory capitalist development. Proposals for a new territorial division and environmental cartography, economic de-structuring, exacerbated privatization, frequent illegal occupation of extensive territories, and unrestricted access to the large economic groups that use or collect nature’s resources ←11 | 12→on a large scale, among others, has generated a lot of tension and will contribute to the growth of poverty among their populations and the irreversible destruction of its ecosystems. Amazonia’s social poverty and environmental destruction are historical and political monuments to this type of capitalism, as shown in Chapter 6.
The use of organized and accumulated knowledge about Amazonia and the humid tropics enables its sustainable development without cutting down a single tree of its forests or polluting its rivers. This should be a development policy guideline for Amazonia. Partnership with their traditional peoples will accelerate the use of this strategic guideline for this region.
Sustainability makes an original contribution to this situation. Today, Brazilian society is acting as a political brake against the disastrous actions of Brazil’s new president to Amazonia. The international trade and economic pressure against the Brazilian government is also a key element in Amazonia’s protection.
Major world newspapers have published their critical opinions about Amazonia’s destruction. The Economist says that “The Amazon is perilously close to the tipping-point. Brazil has the power to save earth’s greatest rainforest-or destroy it.” This same magazine calls all presidents to take up a political position against Bolsonaro’s environmental program; he is considered the world’s worst enemy of the environment (The Economist, 2019). The New York Times also recorded the fast spread of deforestation in Amazonia since Brazil’s new president, Jair Bolsonaro, took over and his government reduced efforts to fight illegal logging, ranching, and mining (Casado and Londoño, 2019). In his article, Stéphen Rostain, Director of Research at CNRS, published in Le Monde magazine, criticizes the world’s passivity in the face of the burning in Amazonia. Rostain asks: “Is Amazonia burning? Yes, but apparently not enough to move powerful policymakers and funders, the archaeologist warns” (Le Monde, 2019a). On September 2019, “over 200 investors representing some U$16.2 trillion under management called on companies to do their part in halting the destruction of the world’s largest tropical rainforest” (Slattery, 2019). This issue needs to be immediately incorporated into the industrialized countries’ diplomatic agendas.
Protests against the destruction of Amazonia are rapidly multiplying worldwide. Some of the untimely actions of the Brazilian government harmful to Amazonia have been annulled by collegiate decisions of Brazilian Superior Courts. However, this has not prevented the destruction of many programs of protection and social promotion in Amazonia. In this sense, Amazonia’s political future is also very uncertain. This news is spreading rapidly worldwide.
It is important to remember that from 2003 to 2016, the Brazilian government of the Workers’ Party implemented important social programs in Amazonia. In this period, Programs such as “Light and Water for All,” “Family Allowance,” ←12 | 13→“Zero Hunger,” “My House – My Life,” and “More Doctors,” among others, have all enabled the social inclusion of more than 4 million people in the region (data 2016). Geographical characteristics, large distances, low population density, climate regimes, and heavy rainfall in the region have been obstacles to making these Programs more efficient. These social initiatives have been important to boost sustainable development in Amazonia’s isolated regions. Brazil’s new president has closed down most of the Programs. This new state of affairs raises the following question: How to build a social