Bridging the gap between climate ambition and reality

Brazil has long cast itself as a pioneer in the global fight against climate change, championing ambitious environmental policies and serving as a bridge between developed and developing nations.

As the world gathers in Belém, the river port city serving as a gateway to the Amazon’s lower region, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is seizing the moment to urge nearly 200 nations toward bold and lasting climate commitments at this year’s UN Climate Change Conference, known as COP30.

Yet as Brazil calls on the world to act, it must also confront its own contradictions.

Is the construction of a new motorway through the rainforest to the megacity of Belém really in line with this?

And what about new oil drilling in the Amazon estuary, which was authorized shortly before the prestigious mammoth climate summit?

In March, climate activists expressed outrage at the wide swath cut for the road, which claimed the lives of valuable trees.

However, the regional government emphasizes that planning and construction have been under way for years and have nothing to do with the UN climate talks.

Climate activists condemn oil licence as sabotage

Not everyone is convinced by Brazil’s green rhetoric. The climate network Observatório do Clima called the government’s decision to authorize new oil drilling by the state-owned giant Petrobras an “act of sabotage” against the very spirit of COP30.

It said this undermined Lula’s claimed leadership role in climate protection. Environmental lawsuits are ongoing – as is the drilling.

Even in Belém itself, contradictions abound. To cope with the influx of nearly 50,000 delegates, journalists and activists, two massive cruise ships now sit moored off the city’s waterfront, doubling as floating hotels.

The stopgap measure was born of necessity – Belém simply ran out of beds – but it also underscores the irony of a climate summit expanding its footprint in the fragile delta it came to protect.

Millions spent on revamping Belém for COP30

In the heat and bustle of Belém, where cracked pavements, crumbling façades, and endless traffic are part of daily life, the city seems newly scrubbed for its moment in the spotlight.

Public squares have been replanted, parks and sewage systems repaired, and roadside palms neatly trimmed.

More than $750 million in federal funds have poured into this Amazonian port – a place that remains poor by Brazilian standards and home to many Indigenous communities – all to prepare for the arrival of the world’s climate elite.

Yet the facelift is only part of the story. Hosting COP30, exactly 10 years after the celebrated Paris Agreement, Brazil hopes to reclaim moral leadership in the global climate debate.

Lula calls this gathering a “COP of truth” – a summit meant to test whether nations are finally ready to match words with action.

Specifically, Brazil is promoting two flagship initiatives. The first is a new multibillion-dollar fund, the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), which aims to protect tropical forests in more than 70 countries, with countries in the Global South taking the lead.

The second aims to channel greater financing to help poorer countries adapt to the worsening effects of global warming – from longer droughts and more violent storms to ever more frequent floods and fires.

The scale of the challenge is staggering. A recent UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report warned of an “enormous gap” in financing for adapting to climate change.

It states that developing countries will need to invest at least $310 billion annually until 2035 to adapt to global warming, which is about 12 times the current level of international public funding.

‘Nature does not bow down to bombs’

The words of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva cut through a world distracted by war.

As conflicts rage from Gaza to Ukraine and Sudan, the political climate has rarely been less hospitable to environmental ambition.

The return of Donald Trump to the White House has further clouded the talks – the United States, once a key architect of the Paris Agreement, has again stepped away from the pact and declined to send a delegation to high-level talks in Belém.

Signed in 2015, the Paris Agreement marked the first time nearly every nation on Earth committed to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, aiming for 1.5 degrees – a historic accord often described as humanity’s best chance to prevent catastrophic climate change.

Its success depends on cooperation and trust, both of which are in short supply today. Lula is also aware of the uncomfortable situation and warns against a departure from multilateralism and nationalist tendencies.

Speaking in New York ahead of the summit, he reminded leaders that no one is safe from the consequences of climate change. “Walls at borders will not stop droughts or storms,” Lula said. “Nature does not bow down to bombs or warships.”

Brazil leads in both renewable energy and oil production

Brazil’s own record on climate protection is also contradictory.

While 90% of its electricity comes from renewable sources such as hydropower – a record among G20 nations – the country also ranks among the world’s top 10 oil producers, with crude recently overtaking soybeans as its main export.

On the one hand, the country boasts about how much the domestic rainforest stabilizes the global climate. At the same time, however, huge areas continue to be lost every year – albeit at a slower pace recently.

The country is also the largest exporter of beef, whose methane emissions contribute significantly to global warming, highlighting another tension between economic activity and environmental stewardship.

Even before the official start of COP30, dozens of global leaders convened in Belém, including German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, alongside top officials from the European Union and the United Nations.

The presence of these delegations gave the summit an early boost: In addition to Brazil’s launching of the tropical forest preservation fund, there were declarations on better combating forest fires and on the global fight against poverty and hunger due to the climate crisis – all supported by dozens of delegations.

Protests return to COP30 Brazil

For the first time in years, visible protests are expected to return at this year’s COP30 climate talks.

Unlike recent conferences held in authoritarian states such as Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt – where repressive security measures strictly restricted demonstrations and confined climate activists to isolated COP grounds – this year’s conference is taking place in a democratic constitutional state.

Rallies have been planned in the heart of Belém, accompanied by coordinated climate strikes around the world.

Thousands of Indigenous activists are also represented in Belém. They are campaigning against the destruction of their ancestral lands, including through deforestation of the rainforest.

Indigenous communities, long recognized as the traditional guardians of the rainforest, are expected to play a central role.

Studies show that regions with certified Indigenous land rights experience significantly less deforestation.

Around 3,000 Indigenous participants from across the globe have descended on Belém, marking what the government calls “the largest participation of Indigenous peoples in the history of the conference.”

Underscoring the critical stakes of the moment, Brazil’s Minister of Indigenous Peoples Sonia Guajajara says: “By upholding our rights, we not only safeguard our way of life and our homes, but also ensure the continued preservation of the Amazon as a vital source of life for the entire planet and for all humanity.”