A large area of the Amazon rainforest has been cut down to build a new road for COP30, the UN climate summit to be held in Brazil. The project has drawn heavy criticism as contrary to the aims of protecting the environment, cutting carbon emissions and saving biodiversity.

Large parts of the Amazon are well known for absorbing carbon and for their unique biodiversity. Local residents complain that the road is destroying their livelihoods, and conservationists say it will threaten wildlife.

The eight-mile, four-lane highway is being built in Belem, an Amazon city in northern Brazil, as part of preparations to host COP30. About 50,000 delegates are expected at the summit. The road is meant to ease traffic in the city, but thousands of acres of forest have been cleared for it.

Part of the road will even run through a protected forest area home to about 800 species of plants and fungi.

The Pará state government approved the project nearly a decade ago, but it was delayed because of its environmental impact. Construction began last June.

About 30 other development projects are under way in Belem for COP30, including new hotels, an airport expansion and the rebuilding of a port so that cruise ships can dock.

The government says the road is being built in an environmentally friendly way. State infrastructure secretary Adler Silveira said it will have cycle lanes and special crossings for wildlife, and will be lit by solar-powered lamps.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has said it will be a COP in the Amazon, not a COP about the Amazon.

Hosting of climate summits has been controversial before. COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, drew criticism for holding talks on environmental protection in an oil and gas producing country.

The large carbon emissions from participants flying in from around the world are also a regular subject of debate.

The report cites The Telegraph.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.