Photograph: Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters
Good morning. When Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva – Lula – was sworn in as president of Brazil on 1 January, one of his tentpole commitments was a promise to reduce the deforestation that was rampant under Jair Bolsonaro to zero by 2030.
That is a hugely ambitious policy. But with the Amazon teetering on the brink of an irreversible tipping point beyond from which it would not be able to regenerate itself – leaving the world without its most important carbon store – it is also a necessary one.
