N4C Weekly Briefing: September 28 - October 4, 2022

Brazil election: ex-president Lula to face Bolsonaro in runoff

The Guardian, Tom Phillips, Andrew Downie and Ana Ionova, 3 October

The Guardian covers the results of Sunday's elections and the run up to a run-off between current President Jair Bolsonaro and former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Sunday's results showed 48.4 percent of votes were for Lula vs  43.2 percent for Bolsonaro. The final results will be known October 30.  Climate Home News notes that Bolsonaro's party outperformed compared to polls running up to the election and gained significant seats in both chambers of Brazil's Congress, which may cement much of his legacy and policy priorities within Brazilian politics for the next few years. TIME and Reuters both cover the outcomes of Sunday's voting. Climate Home News shares a commentary piece from Adriana Ramos, coordinator of  the policy and law program of the Instituto Socioambiental and the Brazilian NGO Forum working group on forests, on the importance of Brazil's October elections on the future of the Amazon. The article looks forward with optimism towards a Brazilian future past the Bolsonaro administration, which enabled record-levels of deforestation and human rights abuses. Grist, Mongabay, NPR, and Carbon Pulse all discuss the importance of Brazil's elections for forests and carbon markets. Mongabay reviews why Bolsonaro's political legacy may live on past his presidency in Brazil's Congress and continue to pose a threat to forests and people. Associated Press digs into why deforestation hasn't been a major part of the presidential campaign despite record-levels of deforestation under Bolsonaro's administration. Mongabay reports that a record 186 Indigenous candidates are running in Brazil’s general elections in October, up 40 percent from the 2018 elections, in response to increasing attacks on their people and land. Mongabay also shares that political candidates in Brazil's state of Mato Grosso are increasingly relying on individuals and partners of companies linked to environmental crimes in the Amazon to fund their campaigns. Mongabay covers a report that claims 26 percent of Amazon forests have transformed irreversibly and show high levels of degradation.

Report: 200 environmental activists killed globally in 2021

Associated Press, 28 September

Associated Press reports that Global Witness' annual report on crimes against environmental defenders found 200 environmental and land defense activists were killed around the world in 2021, including 54 in Mexico, which assumed the position of the deadliest country. Grist notes that the report findings suggest on average, a land defender is killed every other day, but suggests that those numbers are likely an undercount and paints a grim picture of violence directed at communities fighting resource extraction, land grabs, and climate change. The Guardian, BBC, and The Hill cover the report.

'Welcome' or 'unworkable'? Carbon offset registries submit contrasting views to market integrity scheme

Eco-Business, Liang Lei, 29 September

Eco-Business reviews the contrasting approaches carbon offset registries Verra and Gold Standard are taking in addressing changes they wish to see made in the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (IC-VCM) efforts to set and enforce definitive global threshold standards for high-quality carbon credits. Both registries noted the IC-VCM risked creating regulatory hurdles and inspiring lack of confidence in voluntary carbon markets which could threaten their needed growth. Verra has called for a major course correction in the IC-VCM's approach while Gold Standard has shared specific recommendations to the principles the IC-VCM are developing. Carbon Pulse also reports that developer Allcot, the jurisdictional Carbon Markets Fairness Foundation, NGO Conservation International Colombia, and the West African Alliance on Carbon Markets and Climate Finance have called for the IC-VCM to add more safeguards for host communities, ban oil firms from trading and offsetting the units while ensuring they are all correspondingly adjusted. Carbon Pulse shares comments from The Financial Markets Standards Body that highlight setting very high standards for credits, which paves the way for scaling the market through financial instruments, could have pitfalls, depriving much needed projects to combat global warming of capital. GreenBiz dives into four ways that the voluntary carbon market is improving.

GreenBiz shares a commentary from Allan Traicoff, Chief Commercial Officer at Emergent, that highlights a missed opportunity for the Science Based Targets initiative’s (SBTi) on 'beyond value chain mitigation' (BVCM) targets for corporates. Traicoff explains that new guidance on BVCM promised for next year from SBTi will have a strong influence over corporate climate policy and the confusion around BVCM that exists to date. He claims corporate interpretation of past SBTi advice on BVCM has proved to be a blocker to investment in forest protection and prevented as many as 25 corporations from signing up to the LEAF Coalition, depriving forests of around $450 million in climate finance.

Environmental destruction is part of Liz Truss’s plan [Commentary]

The Guardian, George Monbiot, 30 September

The Guardian shares an opinion piece from columnist George Monbiot claiming UK Prime Minister Liz Truss' ideology encourages the extraction of as much income as possible from nature before abandoning it. Calls from many corners of UK civil society to protect nature are rising due to new plans from the Prime Minister that would draw back environmental protections in the name of economic progress. The Guardian reports Liz Truss has been issued a veiled warning over new government policies by the head of Natural England, who says “even bankers need to eat, drink and inhale clean air”. BusinessGreen covers calls from MPs and green groups demanding changes in tack on farming subsidies and nature protection rules from the embattled government as the UK Conservative Conference begins in Birmingham. The Nature-based Solutions Institute at Oxford University and The People's Plan for Nature lead calls from UK civil-society to not pursue plans that will rollback environmental protections across the UK.  The Independent reports that the government has been accused of failing to meet its own target on planting new trees to tackle the climate and nature crises, as statistics showed totals have stayed static. The Times shares a commentary from William Hague stating an attack on nature is a mistake Tories can and should avoid.

SBTi unveils 'world first' climate target standard for farming, land-use, and forestry sectors

BusinessGreen, Amber Rolt, 28 September

BusinessGreen covers the new standard method for including land-based reductions and removals in science-based targets from SBTi. The new standard provides businesses in land-intensive sectors such as food, agriculture and forestry with the tools to measure and reduce emissions and align with the goals of the Paris Agreement. Reset Capital and ESG Investor also cover the new standard.

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Talanoa Institute and Climate Advisers, alongside 41 other Brazilian and International NGOs, deliver a letter to the OECD and member governments about Brazil’s potential membership in the forum. The letter calls upon these institutions to ensure that Brazil meet the OECD’s high standards for environmental protection, climate, and Indigenous rights; and that the OECD conduct a transparent and thorough process of review that incorporates the views and inputs of civil society, Indigenous Peoples, and forest defenders whose lives have been put at risk by illegal deforestation and land theft.

Natural Climate Solutions Alliance publishes A Guide for C-suite Executives in conjunction with ERM, providing high-level guidance for decision makers in choosing high-quality carbon credits to drive demand for NCS and mobilize companies to mitigate their emissions beyond their value chains.

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