Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said Monday that he would participate in a summit with his colleagues from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Indonesia to form a pact between the countries with the largest rainforests on the planet.
“In June, I commit with the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is inviting Brazil and Indonesia to hold a big meeting between the three countries with the largest rainforest,” Lula told the state radio program Voz do Brasil.
Lula said he would talk with the DRC to invite other South American countries that share the Amazon rainforest, of which Brazil owns 60 percent of the territory.
During the electoral campaign, Lula announced the idea of forming an alliance called BIC between Brazil, Indonesia, and the DRC so that the countries with the largest rainforests in the world have shared initiatives towards preserving and against climate change.
“The Amazon is not only ours, but it also belongs to the other South American countries, and it has an extraordinary potential,” Lula said.
The president defended that the Amazon region should generate sustainable resources for the population’s well-being and that it should not be treated as a “sanctuary”.
In this context, he said he favored allowing science “from all over the world” to investigate the South American rainforest to discover economic opportunities for local populations.