Produced by Professor Arilson Favareto of the Federal University of ABC (UFABC), who holds a doctorate in Environmental Science, the study shows that 58% of the municipalities in Matopiba remain poor and are even more unequal than the average for their respective states.
Between 2013 and 2015, an area equivalent to 24 cities the size of São Paulo of native vegetation was lost in the region due to the expansion of export crops. The survey also found that the main investments in the region come from the State, and not from the private sector, since it is the public sector that guarantees the... infrastructure for the export of agricultural products, such as soybeans, for example.
According to Fátima Barros, a member of the Cerrado Network – an organization that fights for the preservation of the biome – it is necessary to combat the idea that deforestation and progress go hand in hand. “Agribusiness accumulates capital for a small group of the population, while the people of the Cerrado are becoming increasingly impoverished,” she told reporter Beatriz Drague Ramos. Radio Brasil TodayFátima also reports that activists defending the environment in the region are being threatened and killed.
Another negative consequence of land concentration and the strengthening of specialization in the production of primary goods has been the increasing decline in... transformation industry in national exports. This sector, which in the 1980s accounted for about 21,8% of exported products, currently accounts for only 11%, the same percentage as in the 1950s.
“There was entrepreneurship, but it was primarily driven by the State, by government institutions. It would therefore be unfair to say that the driving force that made Matopiba this thriving force in the economy and production is due to the heroism of producers from the south who went to the region,” says Adriana Charoux, from Greenpeace's Amazon campaign.