Bolivia: stop torching forests for beef and soy!

21 Bolivian organizations and Amnesty International have called on the president of Bolivia to suspend a decree that came into force in mid-July authorizing “controlled burns”. Since the decree, an area of more than 5.3 million hectares – almost twice the size of Belgium! – has gone up in flames for cattle feedlots and soy farms.

Call to action

With its Presidential Decree 3973 dated 10 July 2019, the Bolivian government authorized the felling and burning of forests in the Beni and Santa Cruz departments to accommodate population growth and the expansion of agriculture.

Global Forest Watch, a service specialized in the evaluation of satellite photos, has counted no less than 313,000 fires in Bolivia since then. According to the environmental NGO FAN, more than a third of the burned land was tropical dry forest, and a further 55% tropical savanna.

In Santa Cruz alone, 1.2 million hectares of protected areas were torched, including large parts of the Otuquis National Park. Researchers estimate that millions of animals were killed by the flames. Fire brigades and residents have been working to contain the blazes with inadequate or improvised equipment.

Drought, strong winds and heat favor the spread of the fires. The root cause of this disaster, however, is Bolivia’s misguided agricultural policy. The CIPCA research center criticized the presidential decree only one day after it took force, arguing that it serves to legalize deforestation by agroindustry and to meet China’s demand for meat.

Indeed – on August 28, 2019, President Evo Morales and the Chinese ambassador to Bolivia celebrated the export of the first shipment of beef as a historic event. Meat exports to China are expected to rise to 117,000 tons by the year 2025.

Back­ground Letter