In 2005, Greenpeace awarded multimillionaire Blairo Maggi its “Golden Chainsaw” award for his company’s role in expanding soy fields into rainforests. Maggi, who last year was elected to a second term as governor of the state of Mato Grosso, has 400,000 acres under production, three-quarters with soy.

As the source of almost one-third of all Brazilian soy, Mato Grosso is intimately linked with soy production. As the area under soy cultivation in the state has boomed — doubling since 1996 — so has the rate of deforestation. Nearly a third of the state’s forests have been felled, and a large share of its southern savanna has been converted to farm fields.

But even in soy’s heartland, things are beginning to shift. Blairo Maggi, who has been nicknamed “Soy King,” is starting to talk about deforestation. “I recognize that we have to do something to address this situation,” says Maggi.

But for Maggi, like most of the farmers in the Amazon basin, the sticking point is still the bottom line. “We have to intervene, but we’re talking about money here,” Maggi says. “How will soy producers be compensated?”

The Ag Frontier

One proposal is to pay Brazilian farmers to get in line with the Forest Code through carbon-trading schemes. Essentially, consumers who want to compensate for carbon emissions released by heating their homes or taking a flight would pay the  farmers to protect or restore forests. Climate-changing carbon emissions would be reduced, while the farmers would get paid to get in compliance. But this kind of arrangement isn’t likely to happen soon.

Meanwhile, pressure for land is growing as Brazil rushes to clear pasture for its booming cattle industry, to sow more sugar cane to meet the growing ethanol demand and to plant soy for its growing export markets. The expansion is moving so quickly that Brazil, already the world’s largest beef exporter, in 2006 surpassed the United States as the largest soy exporter.

In the face of this growth, reforming the practices of the big players like Maggi, Bunge or Cargill is perhaps the best hope for making a significant change. The Conservancy’s project in Santarém is a model that is helping create leverage for change throughout the Amazon, says David Cleary: “If Cargill accepts this in Santarém, we can ask the question, Why only Santarém?”

Out in Belterra, the small farming town south of Santarém, distant horizons and spectacular sunsets provide a beautifully contradictory testament to the deforestation, the disappearing landscape. The Conservancy’s man on the ground backs Cleary’s vision as the most realistic, even if it is, at times, unpalatable to conservationists.

“Do we work with them to change things or do we say we are not working with you?” asks Benito Guerrero, the Responsible Soy Project field coordinator. “That’s the dilemma. Call me naive, call me stupid, but I know that working with Cargill to implement environmental criteria can change the way of buying and will be a lot more successful than saying we won’t work with you because we don’t agree with you or because you broke the law. They’re here; we’re not going to make them go away. We need to work with them.”

People eating Big Macs in Paris and London might one day be grateful.

«Previous  1  2  3  4  5  6  7

Nature picture credits: All Photos © Alex Webb/Magnum Photos