A new COP, a new chance for Brazil.

In 1992, Brazil hosted the largest environmental conference in history up to that point. Leaders from over 170 countries, scientists, environmentalists, and journalists landed in Rio de Janeiro with optimism: there seemed to be time to save the planet. The host country possessed inspiring qualities: biodiverse, abundant, welcoming, and with a sharp discourse on sustainable development and renewable energies.
The 1992 Earth Summit (ECO92) was the genesis of what we know today as COPs (Conferences of the Parties – Climate Summits). It was there that the first major international treaty on curbing greenhouse gas emissions was born: the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), a twin of two other charters of good intentions drafted in Rio, the Convention on Biological Diversity and Agenda 21. Brazil emerged from the 1992 conference with the image of a key nation in the climate debate. After all, the country that is home to the Amazon, is crossed by major rivers, and accounts for a large part of the world's food production cannot be a supporting player on this stage.
Since then, Brazil has worn many different costumes at the COPs: it was a hero of the Kyoto Protocol's carbon market, an example of commitment to the Paris Agreement, an unwelcome extra in the statistics on illegal deforestation – and now it is trying to return to the center stage as a nation that intends to lead the environmental debate.

In 2024, Brazil updated its climate pledge (the famous NDC, an acronym for Nationally Determined Contribution, in accordance with the UNFCCC), announcing targets that sound good on any international stage: to reduce net emissions by between 59% and 67% by 2035. These net emissions correspond to the balance between the total greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere (such as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide) and the volume removed from the air through offsetting actions, such as the preservation and restoration of forests. It also pledged an emissions cap for the period from 2025 to 2030, supported by a new climate committee and the idea of ​​creating a carbon market.
Once again hosting an environmental conference – COP30, to be held in November in Belém do Pará, in the heart of the rainforest – Brazil can present concrete signs of change, such as reduced deforestation rates and the restructuring of environmental enforcement. These are real advances, often achieved with limited resources and under a challenging political and fiscal scenario. Even so, old obstacles remain: land grabbing, legal insecurity in rural areas, and the fragility of institutions on agricultural frontiers. The Amazon, which for years served as a backdrop for speeches, is now the main stage for discussions. And Brazil, with all the contradictions that surround it, is trying to show that it is ready for a new act.
 
If Brazil truly wants to meet its climate goals, it needs to confront an old acquaintance: illegal deforestation, which is advancing in areas where the state doesn't reach. Besides being illegal, deforestation has proven profitable and persistent. It is the engine of almost half of our greenhouse gas emissions.

Contrary to what many imagine, cattle are not the starting point of illegal deforestation – they are, in fact, almost the end point. It all begins with the illegal occupation of public lands: federal areas are invaded and appropriated irregularly, through forged documents and makeshift fences. Public authorities often do nothing to curb these practices. Then comes the illegal extraction of valuable timber, which finances the operation and opens up physical space in the forest. Only then, with the area degraded, does pasture enter. In this scenario, cattle do not deforest: they stamp ownership. Cattle are used to "launder" the occupied land, creating the appearance of productive use where previously there was only native vegetation.
This is not a case of improvised chaos. On the contrary: illegal deforestation is increasingly organized, with financial planning, armed security, and even legal strategies to give the crime an appearance of legality – such as false land ownership records and sham environmental documents. In remote areas of the Legal Amazon, criminal groups fill the void left by the State with their own version of governance – without laws, but with rules.
Agriculture and livestock farming appear as the visible face, but they should not be confused with the central motivation behind deforestation and land grabbing. After all, cattle are just the cheapest way to stamp ownership of land, since they don't require high structural costs, just a few animals and pasture. It's important to recognize that the root of the problem lies in institutional dismantling, the fragility of land governance, and the weakening of oversight of public forests.

While the world debates emissions, it's important to remember that cattle are not exhaust pipes. Although significant and the subject of infamous jokes, methane emissions produced by bovine eructation (burping) – a natural result of enteric fermentation, the digestive process of ruminants – are not comparable to the burning of coal or diesel in industrial activities and transportation. Furthermore, when well managed, pasture has great potential to capture carbon from the atmosphere – a fact that almost never makes the headlines.
Brazilian livestock farming plays an essential role: it provides meat and milk to millions of people, guaranteeing food and nutritional security. It is not without problems, but neither is it synonymous with illegality. There are concrete experiences of productive transition underway. One of the most emblematic examples is the China Beef Protocol, which has regulated beef exports to the Asian giant for about two decades. It establishes rigorous sanitary criteria and requires that exported animals be no more than 30 months old at the time of slaughter. 
This requirement ended up triggering a silent revolution in the field. To slaughter younger cattle, it was necessary to invest in genetics, nutrition, and pasture management—leading to the formation of more productive herds and more intensive systems. Better pasture, better cattle, less time in the corral. The result was threefold: greater productivity, better quality meat, and lower methane emissions per animal, since the life cycle was shortened. The pursuit of meeting a sanitary protocol ended up, unintentionally, pushing Brazilian livestock farming towards a more efficient model with real environmental gains.
This type of agriculture that invests in technology, restores pastures, and adopts regenerative practices is not a promise – it's already in the field. It integrates agriculture, livestock, and forestry, reduces emissions, and wants to play fair. But it continues to compete at a disadvantage as long as invaded land remains cheaper than legalized land – and as long as organized crime stays one step ahead of public policies.
Reports from the Igarapé Institute show that illegal deforestation is increasingly linked to drug trafficking and armed crime. The forest has become a route for trafficking, a bargaining chip, and a logistical hideout. In 2022, approximately 50% of Federal Police operations against environmental crimes in the Amazon found links to criminal organizations.
Combating these criminal organizations requires more than good intentions and export labels. It demands territorial intelligence, land regularization, incentives for legal production, and institutional capacity. Because what's at stake isn't just the climate. It's the territory. It's sovereignty.
 
Despite the challenges in preserving its forests, Brazil has a history of leadership—and, at times, contradiction—in the international climate debate. This narrative began to take shape in 1972 at the Stockholm Conference, the first major UN meeting dedicated to environmental issues. At that time, Brazil adopted a developmentalist stance, prioritizing economic growth over environmental preservation. It argued that industrialized nations should assume responsibility for the damage already caused to the planet, while developing countries, like Brazil, should focus on their industrialization, seen as essential for economic progress, even if it meant postponing environmental concerns.
Two decades later, at the Rio Earth Summit (Eco-92), held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil demonstrated a significant shift, adopting a more conciliatory stance that sought to reconcile development and preservation. Consolidating itself as a leading player in the tropics on environmental issues, the country was the stage for important international agreements, such as the Climate Convention and Agenda 21, which shaped the environmental debate for generations. In 1997, the Kyoto Protocol continued this progress, imposing mandatory emission reduction targets on developed countries, while simultaneously encouraging the engagement of developing countries, such as Brazil, in this global effort.
Brazil enthusiastically entered the Kyoto Protocol, signed in 1997. The first international agreement to establish carbon emission targets, the protocol offered developing nations more incentives than demands. Brazil started well: it was the first nation to have a project approved under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), the technical name for the system that allowed developed countries to invest in emission reduction projects in developing nations in exchange for carbon credits. The pilot project was implemented in 2007 at the Nova Iguaçu landfill in the Baixada Fluminense region, where methane gas resulting from solid waste from a former landfill was captured to generate carbon credits – a symbolic example of what the new climate economy could be.
We enthusiastically embraced the script in other initiatives – biodigesters and biomass energy, among others. The government even established its own authority to organize the queue of projects. But the Kyoto spectacle soon lost its audience. With the United States' withdrawal and the weakening of the targets, the treaty's promises ended up shelved. However, we remain on stage: without mandatory targets, but with a rehearsed discourse, mixing sovereignty, climate justice, and tropical innovation. In 2015, the Paris Agreement stipulated that everyone – rich, poor, and emerging – needed to establish their own climate targets, the NDCs. Brazil presented ambitious targets, updated last year.
 
Between the end of the last decade and the first years of the current one, Brazil faced significant challenges regarding environmental issues. Deforestation increased again, enforcement weakened, and the official discourse oscillated between denial and minimization of the problems. While still present at major international summits, Brazil no longer attracted the spotlight as before and began to be perceived as a less central player. Its international reputation, once applauded, lost some of its luster, reflecting concerns about the conservation of the Amazon—a topic that remains a key element in the global climate narrative.
Despite the adverse scenario, there was institutional resistance. The ABC Plan, created by the federal government in 2010 to promote low-carbon agriculture, was a real example of public policy with concrete results: goals surpassed, technologies disseminated, global recognition. Its updated version, the ABC+ Plan and Renovagro, continues to showcase Brazil's ability to reconcile productivity and sustainability. However, there are still important gaps: the volume of credit is insufficient to meet the challenge of the transition, and resources often do not reach small producers – precisely those who most need support to adopt sustainable practices.
With the arrival of COP29, Brazil reappeared with a revised NDC, absolute targets, a refined discourse, and a willingness to compete for space in a scenario of weakened climate leadership. After the event in Baku, Azerbaijan, came the announcement of the Brazilian Emissions Trading System (SBCE). Still in the regulatory phase, it establishes a ceiling for emissions and allows companies that emit less than authorized to sell this "excess" as carbon credits. The logic is simple: those who pollute more, pay; those who invest in cleaner solutions, gain. The market can become a powerful tool to finance the transition, including in the agricultural sector, connecting good sustainable practices to new sources of revenue.
Meanwhile, Brazilian soil is showing signs that it wants to cooperate. Studies by the Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Removals Estimation System (SEEG) indicate that well-executed management practices, such as the recovery of degraded pastures and the use of integrated systems, are contributing to carbon sequestration in the soil. This means that, contrary to the caricature that portrays agriculture as a climate villain, there is a realistic – and measurable – way to integrate production and climate without sacrificing food security.
 
ACOP30 will be more than just a climate conference. It will be a diplomatic, political, and symbolic test. Brazil arrives with significant commitments and recognized progress, but also with the awareness that there is still a long way to go. Consolidating the reduction of illegal deforestation, expanding climate finance, strengthening land regularization, and protecting vulnerable populations remain fundamental priorities. The forest, which for a long time was a supporting actor, now wants to be the protagonist – and has already begun to play that role.
Even during the event preparations, the first challenges arose. Allegations regarding bidding processes, emergency works, and roads opened in sensitive areas drew attention. These are important warnings, showing how difficult it is to align ambition, execution, and governance in a country of continental dimensions. The best efforts run up against old obstacles, such as the disorderly occupation of the territory and the advance of illegal activities that threaten the authority of the State, hindering the scaling up of positive results.
Despite the difficulties, Brazil has remarkable achievements to show for itself. Consistent environmental laws, firm climate goals, and concrete experiences in sustainable production are helping to reposition the country in the global debate. Agriculture is showing signs of transition: integrated systems, regenerative management, tropical technologies, and initiatives such as the aforementioned China Beef Protocol. The challenge now is to scale up, guarantee technical and financial support, and include those who are still on the margins of this transformation.
COP30 could mark a new chapter — with Brazil combining discourse, policy, and practice. Belém, despite the anticipated logistical problems, will host global leaders, investors, and civil society for an event that raises expectations for the country's consistent and continuous progress. Because the world already knows the story and hopes, this time, that it will have a new ending — worthy of the stage we have chosen.