JF_dorio_AE

 

On Thursday (02), during a public hearing of the Committee on the Environment and Sustainable Development, the President of the Parliamentary Environmental Front, Deputy Sarney Filho (PV-MA), and the Secretary of Extractivism and Sustainable Rural Development of the Ministry of Environment, Egon Krahhecke, defended the need to implement an ecological-economic zoning (ZEE) in the Amazon, as a pre-condition for the agrarian regulation in that region. The secretary also affirmed that that zoning may be concluded still this year, and that the regulation should occur concomitantly.

Urgent Demand
Deputy Asdrubal Bentes (PMDB-PA), who is the rapporteur on the Provisional Measure (MP) 458/09, which handles the regulation of land in the Amazon, said that there is an urgent demand for regulation, and that it is impossible to link it to the zoning. The MP authorizes the transference, without bidding processes, of land belonging to the Union and measuring up to 1,500 hectares, in the Legal Amazon, to those owing their possession since before December 2004.

Softening of conditions
Krachecke criticized several changes made by the rapporteur, which would have rendered the MP less restrictive, such as the one allowing the immediate sale of regulated land. He also condemned the fact that the report waives the requirement – provided for in current legislation – of forest re-composition in some cases. “That matter has already been well established in the very Forest Code, when it allows the possibility to reduce from 80% to 50% the re-composition of the legal reserve in areas of consolidated use, according to what the ecological-economic zoning provides for”, he highlighted.

Hypocrisy
Asdrubal Bentes affirmed that the prohibition to sell land would be hypocritical, since it would happen anyway, by means of off-the-record agreements. According to his evaluation, instead of prohibiting it, it is possible to require that the buyer has the same profile of the seller. For him, the State will lose control of the title holders the sale is forbidden.

However, the deputy mentioned the possibility to review the limit date for the regulation of lots – the MP establishes December 2004, and the report, February 2009, which, according to Krakhecke, will encourage squattering. Bentes said he will meet with the government to handle that issue. “There are divergent standpoints, and we are discussing them, in order to reach an agreement. We will now debate them in a work meeting and see how far we can go in fulfilling claims”, he declared.

The deputy also said that there is no reason to exclude from regulation those settlers who are also civil servants. According to him, it is common that a school’s janitor has also a “small plantation” to complement his income, and he cannot be excluded from the program. Bentes intends to only restrict the participation of servants involved in the process, such as those working at the National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (Incra).

Corporations
The representative of the Ministry of Environment also criticized the elimination of other restrictions on the regulation of land by the rapporteur, such as the impeachment for corporations (companies, NGOs and associations, for instance).

Also according to Krakhecke, it is a mistake to allow someone who has already lots in that region to receive titles of others he/she has irregularly occupied. According to him, the rapporteur should at least set the limit of 1,500 hectares for the total amount of land granted to someone.

Report - Sílvia Mugnatto/Rádio Câmara
Editing - Marcos Rossi/Rejane Xavier
Translation - Positive Idiomas Ltda