Brazil has cancelled a 10-year-old ban on sugarcane cultivation in its Amazon rainforest and central wetlands, the government gazette said on Wednesday, which environmentalists criticised as another assault on the country's sensitive ecosystems.
The government did not explain its decision, which was signed by President Jair Bolsonaro and the ministries of Economy and Agriculture.
Although areas under sugarcane cultivation are currently being reduced in Brazil, green groups worry that the crop could eventually be planted in recently cleared areas in the Amazon, the world's largest rainforest, or parts of the Cerrado regions.
Environmentalists said the decision to reverse the 2009 decree was another step by the Bolsonaro government to reduce protections for the Amazon, whose preservation is considered important to control emissions of greenhouse gases.
'Predatory Economic Expansion'
Ending the prohibition will expose the Amazon and other vulnerable areas to "predatory economic expansion," Brazil's Climate Observatory, a network of green groups including WWF, Conservation International and others, said in a statement.
Brazil's cane industry group Unica on Wednesday called the ban anachronistic and said that other tools, such as the new Brazilian Forest Code, were sufficient to regulate agricultural activities in environmentally vulnerable areas.
Leftist leader Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva introduced the ban at a time when the sugarcane product ethanol was being championed as an environmentally friendly biofuel that would help countries reduce their carbon footprints.
Brazil is the world's largest producer of sugarcane.
Concerns
The excitement over ethanol's prospects led to worries that expanding cane cultivation in Brazil could lead to deforestation and occupy land that could be used for food production.
The market failed to pan out, however. Exports remain limited with Brazil and the United States being the only countries producing and using ethanol on a large scale.
Instead, the area planted with cane has been reduced over the past five years, partly due to low global sugar prices.
Former Environment Minister Carlos Minc, who was behind Lula's decision to introduce the ban, said reversing the decree would hurt the eco-friendly image of Brazilian agriculture.
"This decision will tarnish the image of Brazilian ethanol in the world," Minc said in a Twitter posting.
Brazil's Agriculture Minister had no immediate comment.
