EU-Brazil trade should be more sustainable, 600 scientists say

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EU-Brazil trade should be more sustainable, 600 scientists say

3 May 2019
News
In an open letter, 600 European scientists and 300 indigenous groups are calling for the EU to insist on the respect for environmental and human rights standards in its current trade negotiations with Brazil.

Before the EU can conclude its free trade agreement with Mercosur states – Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay – a lot still needs to be cleared up, according to the open letter, which says environmental and human rights standards in Brazil should be at the very top of the agenda.

“Brazilian politics has become quite frightening. The EU cannot just stand there and watch,” Laura Kehoe, a biologist at Oxford University and one of the call’s initiators, told EURACTIV.

Deforestation in the Amazon forest is taking place as fast as it used to ten years ago. This is because Jair Bolsanero’s government has softened many environmental protection laws, the Brazilian currency [real] has weakened, and there is an increasing demand for products such as soya and beef.

Brazil is the biggest exporter of agricultural products to the EU. “We hardly know anything about the origins of products and what the effects of in-country manufacture are,” said Kehoe. That is why scientists are requesting that the exact origins of products are more traceable.