Current Events > GOP financier is driving force behind Amazon deforestation

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https://theintercept.com/2019/08/27/amazon-rainforest-fire-blackstone/

TWO BRAZILIAN FIRMS owned by a top donor to President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are significantly responsible for the ongoing destruction of the Amazon rainforest, carnage that has developed into raging fires that have captivated global attention.

The companies have wrested control of land, deforested it, and helped build a controversial highway to their new terminal in the one-time jungle, all to facilitate the cultivation and export of grain and soybeans. The shipping terminal at Miritituba, deep in the Amazon in the Brazilian state of Par, allows growers to load soybeans on barges, which will then sail to a larger port before the cargo is shipped around the world.

The Amazon terminal is run by Hidrovias do Brasil, a company that is owned in large part by Blackstone, a major U.S. investment firm. Another Blackstone company, Ptria Investimentos, owns more than 50 percent of Hidrovias, while Blackstone itself directly owns an additional roughly 10 percent stake. Blackstone co-founder and CEO Stephen Schwarzman is a close ally of Trump and has donated millions of dollars to McConnell in recent years.

Blackstone is committed to responsible environmental stewardship, the company said in a statement. This focus and dedication is embedded in every investment decision we make and guides how we conduct ourselves as operators. In this instance, while we do not have operating control, we know the company has made a significant reduction in overall carbon emissions through lower congestion and allowed the more efficient flow of agricultural goods by Brazilian farmers.

The port and the highway have been deeply controversial in Brazil, and were subjects of a 2016 investigation by The Intercept Brasil. Hidrovias announced in early 2016 that it would soon begin exporting soybeans trucked from the state of Mato Grosso along the B.R.-163 highway. The road was largely unpaved at the time, but the company said it planned to continue improving and developing it. In the spring of 2019, the government of Jair Bolsonaro, elected in fall 2018, announced that Hidrovias would partner in the privatization and development of hundreds of miles of the B.R.-163. Developing the roadway itself causes deforestation, but, more importantly, it helps make possible the broader transformation of the Amazon from jungle to farmland.

The roadway, B.R. 163, has had a marked effect on deforestation. After the devastation that began under the military dictatorship and accelerated through the 1970s and 80s, the rate of deforestation slowed, as a coalition of Indigenous communities and other advocates of sustaining the forest fought back against the encroachment. The progress began turning back in 2014, as political tides shifted right and global commodity prices climbed. Deforestation began to truly spike again after the soft coup that ousted President Dilma Rousseff of the Workers Party in 2016. The right-wing government that seized power named soy mogul Blairo Maggi, a former governor of Mato Grosso, as minister of agriculture.

Yet even as deforestation had been slowing prior to the coup, the area around the highway was being destroyed. Every year between 2004 and 2013 except 2005 while deforestation in Amazonia as a whole fell, it increased in the region around the B.R.-163, the Financial Times reported in September 2017. That sparked pushback from Indigenous defenders of the Amazon. In March, Hidrovias admitted that its business had been slowed by increasing blockades on B.R. 163, as people put their bodies in front of the destruction. Still, the company is pushing forward. Hidrovios recently said that, thanks to heavy investment, it planned to double its grain shipping capacity to 13 million tons.

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I thought this was about Blackstone Labs at first, which made me sad because they're an awesome company

Blackstone even sounds like the name of a business run by a Captain Planet villain.
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Why are republicans literally evil?
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Capitalism is cancer
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It's real mindboggling how Americans haven't revolted or burned down D.C. yet. Pretty sure all of the atrocities and damage by the GOP would warrant just blowing it all up and starting over.
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shocked pikachu
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So when does Trump get directly implicated?
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NinjaWarrior455 posted...

Capitalism is cancer

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Grain and soybean growers in the US struggle...

GOP: lets destroy the Amazon so we can grow grain and soybeans there for cheap!
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Blackstone is committed to responsible environmental stewardship, the company said in a statement. This focus and dedication is embedded in every investment decision we make and guides how we conduct ourselves as operators.

This would be so funny if it wasn't so hideous.
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I really don't get why some people like destroying things like that.
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uwnim posted...

I really don't get why some people like destroying things like that.

It makes them a bunch of money in the short term, and they won't be alive to see the long-term consequences.
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Do you like societal collapse? Keep voting republican

UnholyMudcrab posted...

It makes them a bunch of money in the short term, and they won't be alive to see the long-term consequences.

The thing is, the rich people who do this stuff get no benefit from having more money. After a point, additional money has no effect on your life and just becomes a meaningless score.
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Highways and ocean ports, modernization...

uwnim posted...

UnholyMudcrab posted...

It makes them a bunch of money in the short term, and they won't be alive to see the long-term consequences.

The thing is, the rich people who do this stuff get no benefit from having more money. After a point, additional money has no effect on your life and just becomes a meaningless score.

Doesn't matter to them
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uwnim posted...

The thing is, the rich people who do this stuff get no benefit from having more money. After a point, additional money has no effect on your life and just becomes a meaningless score.

When you're right, you're right
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So, they own a small minority stake of the company?

Yet it's this one guy's fault?
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The Intercept is twisting facts to blame Republicans for something!?? I'm shocked!!

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shockthemonkey posted...

And what facts were twisted?

The Brazilian company is partly owned by Blackstone. The connection, which works only on the financially illiterate, is that the CEO of Blackstone is personally running one of his firms' hundreds of portfolio companies, and he is apparently doing so with evil motives.

In reality, Schwarzman has absolutely nothing to do with the operations of Blackstone's portfolio companies.

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shockthemonkey posted...

lmao

Ok so none of the facts were twisted and youre just obfuscating as usual

The connection is non-existent with Schwarzman, and these kinds of articles only get a reaction because The Intercept knows that its readers have zero understanding of how private equity or finance in general work.

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shockthemonkey posted...

Oh god is this when you tell us youre an investment banker who dates celebrities again?

Because saying a dude who invests in and then profits off deforestation isnt involved with deforestation is as believable as you dating celebrities.

You can just admit you have no fucking clue how private equity investments work rather than being passive aggressive.

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I'm suddenly reminded of Blade Runner, because that''s most likely the future we're headed for...

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SpudForce posted...

I'm suddenly reminded of Blade Runner, because that''s most likely the future we're headed for...

That wouldn't be too bad, the cityscape was gorgeous. I'd be more concerned if the future were like Mad Max.

uwnim posted...

UnholyMudcrab posted...

It makes them a bunch of money in the short term, and they won't be alive to see the long-term consequences.

The thing is, the rich people who do this stuff get no benefit from having more money. After a point, additional money has no effect on your life and just becomes a meaningless score.

I guess you could say it's like an addiction.
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