RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – To fight fires in the area, IBAMA said it will hire 1,700 firefighters exclusively for the 9 states of the Amazon basin, including Rondônia, Acre, Amazonas, Roraima, Pará, Amapá, Tocantins, Mato Grosso and Maranhão.
Monthly environmental inspection reports will be expected, along with weekly reports from the Deforestation Combat Group in the Amazon, “to measure the fulfillment of the institutional goals,” the article said.
Preserving the Amazon is a requirement of several of Brazil’s main trade partners, which is why fighting deforestation is among the government’s priorities, it added.
IBAMA will invest some R$50 (US$9.7) million on these priority actions, with the bulk of the funds earmarked for hiring and training firefighters, buying personal protection equipment, and acquiring vehicles and helicopters for the Federal Brigades Program.
At the 26th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP26) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in early November 2021 in Glasgow, UK, Brazil committed to eradicating illegal logging by 2028 and cutting its emission of greenhouse gases by 50% by 2030.