Comprehension Exercise – 35
Creative Writing – 93
Read the following write-up and answer the questions that follow
Continuation from Comprehension Exercise – 34
This week, he accused left-wing nongovernmental organizations of deliberately starting the fires, but later admitted that he had no evidence to back up the claim. “Everything indicates that people went there to film and then to set fires,” he said. “That is my feeling.” Bolsonaro’s stance here is part of his broader nationalist politics. He and his allies have no time for lectures from foreign elites and nothing but scorn for the indigenous Amazonian communities and leftist environmental policies that they see as obstacles to economic growth. The surge in deforestation has provoked a diplomatic spat between Brazil and European countries and now may halt a free-trade deal between the European Union and South American trading bloc Mercosur.
The putative pact requires a commitment to the Paris climate accord, which among other things calls for an end to illegal deforestation in the Amazon by 2030. But Bolsonaro may be tempted to take Trump’s path instead and pull Brazil out of the Paris agreement, which would mark a significant blow for global efforts around climate action. “Brazil has a responsibility not only to its own citizens but also to the entire earth,” wrote American climate campaigner Bill McKibben. “Bolsonaro’s tantrums, like Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris accords, damages not just his own nation for a few years; it also imperils the entire earth for millennia to come.”
But such an appeal won’t move Bolsonaro. “This seems to be at the heart of a lot of what the president believes. It’s not just about climate change ― it’s also about globalism, sovereignty and economic development,” Oliver Stuenkel, an international relations professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation in São Paulo, told HuffPost. “For the president, it’s, if you believe in [climate change], it’s a conspiracy meant to keep Brazil from developing. … And he knows this causes agony and outrage among his international opposition.” Nationalists like Trump and Bolsonaro probably see the cause of climate action as a political dead end for their base. On the other side of the Atlantic, their right-wing counterparts in Europe are a bit more attuned to the scientific reality of the threat but still exhibit deep contempt for some activists seeking to drive greater awareness.
In the United States, climate change is a fully partisan issue, largely thanks to the Republican Party’s wholesale embrace of the fossil fuel industry — the American analog to Brazil’s agribusiness lobby. But concern is widespread on the left and a key subject of debate ahead of the 2020 election. On Thursday, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders unveiled a $16.3 trillion Green New Deal platform, possibly the most radical proposal put forward so far by a candidate that would create some 20 million new jobs while dramatically restructuring American society and economy around a supposedly more sustainable future.
“We need a president who has the courage, the vision, and the record to face down the greed of fossil fuel executives and the billionaire class who stand in the way of climate action,” the plan’s call to action declares, taking aim at Trump and his allies. “We need a president who welcomes their hatred.”
Questions
16. How President Bolnaro and the people around him treat the views of foreign experts and Amazon activists in the matter of conservation of the Amazon rain forests?
17. What could be the fall-out of the European anger against Brazil over Amazon deforestation?
18. What does the Paris climate accord envisage with regard to Amazon forest’s future?
19. What line could Bolsnaro take in respect of Brazil stand on Paris climate accord?
20. What does Bill McKibbon feel about Boslnaro’s stand on conservation of Amazon forests?
21. What is at the core of Bolsonaro’s antipathy towards climate change campaigners?
22. How the right wing leaders of Europe differ from Bolsonaro and Trump over the idea of combating climate change?
23. In what way Brazil under Bolsonaro and the U.S. under Trump look alike with regard to their approach to climate change?
24. What plan Bernie Sanders has unveiled to ensure a more sustainable future for Americans?