Hello, everybody. Are we good to go . I am mark tercek, and originally of the nature conservatory. Im glad to be the moderator of todays discussion. We have a great panel. To my left is monica de bolle from the Houston Institute for economics. To her left is daniel zarin with climate and landuse alliance and onscreen is my good friend peter seligman, cofounder and ceo of nia tero which focuses on a lot of issues we will be discussing today. He is the founder and longtime ceo of Conservation International where he continues to be the chairman. Our topic today is the Global Impact of the amazon rain forest you have been reading about in the news. This raises so many issues. First of all, what is really happening, hard to tell. How much of this is due to illegal logging, industrial ag, bad government policy, or is Climate Change itself impacting the forest . Also, the question arises, what happens . Until recently the amazon was one of the great conservation success stories. Through a great effort the brazilian government, local government, brazilian growers, brazilian ranchers, international companies, international ngos, one of the Great Success stories of conservation we use to boast about was bringing deforestation way down in the amazon. That has changed. What happened . Another question on my mind important to discuss at the council on Foreign Relations is what can the International Community do . Who really owns the amazon . Most of it is within brazil, not all of it but its impact on the rest of the world especially the climate challenge, is huge. Where are we in terms of Tipping Points . We know as Climate Change progresses or worsens it can accelerate bad outcomes. Are we close to that today in the amazon . There are a host of other issues. What about the other amazon countries . What about the role of Indigenous People and impacts on Indigenous People . Or biodiversity itself . We will touch on all those issues. I get to ask questions for 30 ms. And then we will open up. Peter, are you set . Can you hear us . I can hear you perfectly. Sound good, then lets start. Start by asking dan to just give us an assessment of where things stand. It is hard to know by reading the paper, what is causing what, what is the role of fires, logging, ranching, government policy . Where does deforestation stand and what is the outlook . Are we near any Tipping Points . Thanks for the opportunity to be here with all of you. We are all here because of these fires and deforestation that has been in the news in the amazon over the past several months peeking in the summer and august. It is important to put things into context. Fires occur all the time within the region. It is important to know that in brazil in 2019 these fires were not produced by Climate Change, they were not driven by drought. Through the end of august this year, the 2019 dry season was about 50 wetter than we have seen in the previous few years yet on average we had about 50 more fires in the same period so the fires were not driven by drought, the drought season the number of dry days were fewer than in the past. The fires, theres the first thing i want to take home from here. The second thing, these were fires that occurred deliberately for the purpose of deforestation. For the purpose of land clearance and most of that and when i say most, estimates are 90 of that is illegal. Perhaps 30 of that is driven by speculators who are clearing public lands. This is a complex criminal enterprise in brazil with many variations, our aim ultimately, selling falsely legitimated clear land as a huge markup. About another 30 occurred on private property, mostly exceeding the limits on deforestation that were agreed to in brazil in 2012 under a major revision that was agreed to by all the associations in brazil. Another 20 was likely small farmer clearing mostly on poorly managed settlements and about 10 occurred in areas that have no designated ownership. Like the first category that is all about land speculation. They are in excellent technical notes prepared by a group, the amazonian institute for environmental research. Overall these are official data that came out this morning, year on year deforestation increased in the brazilian amazon by 30 this year over last year to nearly 10,000 km. That is the official data, the highest in the past decade and it is important to know that that doesnt cover the period we are talking about which mostly emerged beginning in august because the deforestation from august 1st to july 30th in 2019. We had several thousand square kilometers cleared from august, september and bit into october. The third point, mostly illegal deforestation and fires associated with it both began and ended with the support of the executive branch of the brazilian government which has prioritized the undoing of 15 years of governmental progress in deforestation control. Fires peaked in the second and third week of august following what were deliberately organized fire days in part of the amazon which were pretty much an open secret in the responsible Government Agencies but what happened then was no one really counted on a huge amount of smoke reaching subpar. Smoke reaching sao paulo, and blackening the skies in the city of sao paulo for about four days. And following that later that month following what youve already got about a lot of controversy and international fronts, president bolsonaro sent in the army and declared a 60 day moratorium on fire in the region, which point fires stop being set. And the fires but Government Support is responsible for both starting and ending this problem this year. Sp so not climate, deliberate, turned on and off by Government Action and inaction. Mark asked a little bit for me to Say Something about the issue of Tipping Points that if, in the news quite a lot, and suffice to say its a very complex area around the science, but the consensus as more and more data are emerging is that we are very, very close, particularly iner the southern d eastern parts of the basin to Tipping Point where the combination of landuse change and Climate Change will mean that force will not grow back, that we will be seeing the convergence to savannah like tropical ecosystems over the coming years. So having said that depressing statement, mark, authored back to you. Monica, given this challenge, what are the options the International Community faces and the brazilian government . How can this challenge addressed . So starting with the International Community, i think theres one area where not a lot hass been done, not a lot is perhaps fairly euphemistically putting it, and that has to do with payment for environmental services. Of course conserving the amazon, conserving the amazon in brazil and the other countries that the amazon spans is a service that is provided to the rest of the world. Because as a term that has come out that some people use and that i particularly like, we can go into the explanation of this term, is that the episode is really a carbon bomb in the sense that it retains a lot of carbon under the soil. And the moment that you start deforesting, this carbon is released into the atmosphere and very, very large quantities. So the service that is being provided by keeping the forest intact is that of keeping all of that carbon underneath thed ground. There is an issue of how do you actually set up payment for these kinds of financial services, which would be very beneficial from the point of view of incentivizing government, in particular governments that now briefly taken different stances on d4 station and on conservation of the amazon. It provides a powerful incentive for them to change the policies back to one of reserving and conserving. Fo so i think this is an area where the International Community has to think more about and asked to do something about it because in essence we are talking about an entire biome that has this characteristic of maintaining carbon underneath the soil and the services which are global in scale are not being paid for. That i was is one area that the International Community needs to think hard about. There are other things like the amazon fund, for example, which is chiefly an initiative that was spearheadede, by norway and germany, but largely norway, and which did serve the purpose of trying to get a few things in conservation come in deforestation within the amazon but we know the size of the amazon fund is small, in relative terms. And at the moment there are issues with the amazon fund and the government of brazil. So this is another area where some thought has to go into sort of what do we do with the amazon fund . Do we make it larger . To ask for more contributors from other parts of the globe . What can they effectively do . How did we set up a good governmentef structure for this fund if it is to become so much larger and how do we do this with what the brazilian government currently wants . At another area that needs to be thought much more about were a lot of reflection has to go into. As for the government of brazil specifically, there are lots of things that, and dan referenced some of them. We know there was this huge period spanning from 2004 until about 2014 just before 2014 [inaudible] and they fell dramatically because specific policies that were put in place, and so we knew what to do with deforestation because we tried it in the past and the policy work. It involved a number of things not just the monitoring, the very sophisticated satellite imagery monitoring Law Enforcement and incarnation ofe several incremental agencies in brazil but also measures like him for instance, as an economist i like this measure, the central bankk of brazil in 2008 instituted a resolution that essentially created, because in the Amazon Region, world credit is essentially actually in a lot of brazil but in the Amazon Region specifically world credit is essentially provided i public banks. And so what the centralt bank dd was institute a blacklist, lets say, of districts within the amazon or municipalities within the amazon where deforestation rates were occurring at a much higher pace and where there was evidence that farmers, local farmers were not meeting the environmental regulations in the environmental norms. This blacklist, so anybody who is put on this lack list was essentially shut off from credit markets. They were not receiving any kind of access to credit. And according to a lot of research has been done on this initiative a loan, that measure, just that measure served to reduce deforestation by about 20 in different parts of the amazon and in different parts of the amazon where it was applied. So there are things like this that have already worked, in essence you have carrots and sticks, and you have policies and thinks that and fork in the past. Thisth Central Bank Resolution that i mentioned is still in the fact so it could be used. Once again it hasnt been revoked. Its just that the current government is not moving in that direction. Its not using these tools that has available to it. In fact, one of the things it has done is dismantled to some extent the capacity of the monitoring and a Law Enforcement abilities of the environmental agencies. So thats where we are. Okay, thank you, monica. Lets turn to peter. Peter, there are a lot of additional questions. I know youve been focusing on thin. Ga the other amazonian countries, the role of china, the role of indigenous communities in thehe amazon. How did all those players fit into this storyline . Pretty directly. [laughing] i would say that part of the driver of deforestation, of course we talked about is, the demand for Agricultural Commodities. If you trace where the fires are taking place, and what commodities arere being grown ad where those commodities are going, you can see direct correlation. , you can see direct correlation. Theres an increase in delivery to europe and an increase in delivery of soy in particular to china. Beef to china to russia to egypt. So theres a direct correlation between this increase and actually the tariff war between the United States and china, which has resulted in a decrease in the importing of soy and beef from the United States to those of the countries. Number one, theres a Global Economic connection. Number two, its really intriguing to me as that the amazon, which is 880 million hectors, onethird of that, or 30 of of that actually is under the guardianship of recognized indigenous protected areas. Sure the constitution of brazil is actually very clear as to the rights of Indigenous Peoples. As a little bit of an aside, president bolsonaro has stated in speeches that the institute that he admires the most in the United States has been the u. S. Calvary because of its effectiveness in eliminating indigenous native americans. So what is happening in brazil now is not only is 30 of the amazon under indigenous guardianship legally, but the government has said those forested areas need to be accessed. We know we cannot do it legally that we will look the other direction. And so what is happening is an assault on Indigenous Peoples rights. Whats interesting about those Indigenous Peoples is that they are very effective in securing the help of these large ecological territories that are the own. In fact, if you look at maps right now to look at an overlay of fires with indigenous territories, indigenous territories are actually the most secure of the territories actually resisting invasion of fire and agriculture. So Indigenous Peoples play a very, very Important Role in securing the help of the amazon come at a schutze its not just the amazon. Until about 35 of the entire terrestrial earth is under the garden ship of Indigenous Peoples, and those are the territories on this planet that contains about 70 of the intact ecosystem. Direct correlation with commodity price, direct correlation with Indigenous Peoples. And thats just the state of the world. So weve got some important allies in Indigenous Peoples, and we also need to be looking at those organizations that are directly involved in the financing and the trading of commodities so that we can get at the heart of how to solve some of these problems. Id like to comment for just a second something that monica talked about, which is this concept of payment for ecosystem services, and the enormous role that brazil plays in terms of carbon captured sequestration. About 5 of the the co2 that is human caused is absorbed by amazonian parks. So there is an outsized role that the amazon plays. And when you look at solutions, when you to look at both whats in the selfinterest of the brazilians in terms of not allowing a Tipping Point so that that forest becomes savannah, which would be devastating to the agricultural and precipitation at agricultural productivity within brazil itself. And so that in the selfinterest of brazil to keep that forest standing. But the waters and precipitation that emerges from the amazon doesnt just stay in brazil. It actually goes up to atmosphere rivers to benefit midwest United States. So there is a strong argument that this is a global good and it should be a common there should be a concerted, thought the way to balance the benefits to brazil and the benefits to the rest of the world. So i would just say that, its a complex question for sure, and its a very difficult question right now in terms of how you address the challenges in brazil. Its no less complicated than the challenges we are facing in the United States in terms of the political world. I wish there was an easy solution. There is not. Thank thank you, panelists. Really interesting. It reminds me in my time at the Nature Conservancy the way i think about this is welcome we wish that federal governments were doing more to address the climate challenge but for a variety of reasons they in many cases seem to be backing away. Ngos i think are doingeverything they can. I think there are limits to how much an ngo can deal. But then i thought about the private sector and said how can we get the private sector to do more . Well, you know, during the time of success producing deforestation the private sector both international and Brazilian Companies played a very big role in helping brazil understand in their self, enlightened self interest to get this right. What can we do is that a lever that is available for us now . Can the panelists imagine somehow global multinational food companies, Commodity Traders and their brazilian counterparts can take stronger action, boycotts, these kinds of things . Because you would think that would get the attention of the coming fast. They care about the economy in general. They care about agribusiness. Is there a potential there . What do you guys think . Happy to kick off that part of the discussion, mark. There is, as pete and monica mentioned, really clear evidence that there is self interest, if we are looking the level of a kind of national selfinterest, public selfinterest. This period of decline in deforestation of the decade roughly from 20042014 in brazil was