Saving the Amazon with economics
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 25 October 2021
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Amazon is the world's largest rainforest but this crucial carbon sink is facing increased deforestation. Land clearing for mining or agriculture has increased under Brazil's president Jair Bolsanaro. But the world needs the Amazon jungle to keep absorbing carbon if more ambitious climate goals are to be met. Is there a place for the private sector to step in where governments have failed? Vivienne Nunis hears from economist Nat Keohane about a new not-for-profit called Emergent. It acts as a kind of middle man, connecting tropical forests with corporations searching for ways to cancel out their emissions. Can it work? Also on the programme, journalist Karla Mendes explains how many Brazilians feel about the Amazon's plight, while Robert Muggah from the Igarapé Institute tells us companies such as Google have stepped up to help with deforestation mapping, when government agencies had their budgets cut. Producer: Sarah Treanor. Image: A toucan in the Amazon rainforest. Credit: Getty Images
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Amazon rainforest. |
| 0:04.0 | Today on Business Daily with me Vivian Nunes, we're asking how this crucial carbon sink can be protected. |
| 0:14.0 | Its survival is imperative if the world is to meet its climate change goals and keep global warming under control. |
| 0:22.5 | But deforestation is growing. |
| 0:25.6 | There are many, many players who are behind for deforestation. |
| 0:31.3 | The main bad guys, we could say, are the big companies. |
| 0:39.1 | Could the answer lie in connecting cashed-up corporations with the communities who need economic |
| 0:44.8 | incentives to stop felling trees? |
| 0:47.8 | If we can get this to scale, this could make Brazil or Indonesia or other forest nations |
| 0:53.6 | be the world's first green economic superpowers, right? |
| 0:57.3 | And that's what we're after as a better model of economic development. |
| 1:00.4 | That's Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 1:10.2 | Brazil is so big. |
| 1:11.6 | I can say that just a very small part of the population really has been to the Amazon. |
| 1:17.6 | First of all, because it's really expensive to go there. |
| 1:21.6 | It's cheaper traveling to Argentina or other countries in Latin America |
| 1:26.6 | or even going to the US.S. or Europe. |
| 1:29.6 | I can say that many Brazilians are worried by the Amazon, but there is a part of the population |
| 1:37.3 | that thinks about it at something really, really far and even support the Bolsonaro's speech, you know. |
| 1:50.1 | The Amazon is well known for being the largest rainforest in the world. |
| 1:55.9 | The forest spans eight countries, nearly 7 million square kilometres, |
| 2:00.5 | and 40% of the entire South American continent. |
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