Biden on historic visit to Amazon, a symbol for climate before Trump's return

Joe Biden will become the first sitting U.S. president to travel to the Amazon on Sunday, a historic visit overshadowed by fears for the environmental policy of the United States created by the imminent return of Donald Trump to the White House.

Biden is traveling to the Brazilian city of Manaus, in the heart of the world's largest rainforest, as part of a tour of South America – likely the last major foreign trip of his presidency.

The 81-year-old president is scheduled to fly over the forest and visit a museum before speaking to the media, the White House said. He will also meet with indigenous people and local officials working to protect the Amazon.

The stop, between an Asia-Pacific summit in Lima and a G20 leaders’ meeting in Rio de Janeiro, underscores the Democrat’s commitment “to combating climate change, at home and abroad,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan said.

“This is clearly one of the defining causes of President Biden’s presidency,” Sullivan said at a briefing Wednesday. “This will be the first visit by a sitting U.S. president to the Amazon.”

The visit is all the more symbolic as the world prepares for the return to power on January 20 of Donald Trump, who is raising concerns about the climate commitments of the United States, the world's second largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China.

Trump withdrew the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement during his first term, and has warned that he wants to do the same during his second.

– Fires and deforestation –

Aerial view of the Manicoré River in the Amazon, in the Brazilian state of Amazonas, on June 7, 2022 © AFP – MAURO PIMENTEL

The Amazon rainforest, which stretches across nine countries, plays a crucial role in the fight against climate change thanks to its capacity to absorb carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. It is also one of the areas most vulnerable to climate change and environmental degradation.

The Amazon is normally one of the wettest regions in the world. But with the severe drought hitting all of South America, it has been ravaged this year by its worst fires in two decades, according to the European Copernicus Observatory.

Deforestation has also caused it to lose an area equivalent to that of Germany and France combined in four decades, according to a recent study by the Amazonian Network for Socio-Environmental and Geographic Information (RAISG), a collective of researchers and NGOs.

M. Biden will meet next week in Rio with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has made forest protection a priority and has pledged to zero illegal deforestation in Brazil's Amazon by 2030.

A bilateral meeting is scheduled to take place on the sidelines of the G20 leaders' summit in the Brazilian city on Monday and Tuesday, which will be looming over Donald Trump.

Many experts have warned that a second Trump term risks slowing the Biden administration's transition to renewable energy and undermining hopes of meeting crucial long-term climate goals.

During his campaign, the Republican promised to “drill like crazy” and increase extraction of fossil fuels. He has also openly questioned the reality of climate change.

A US withdrawal from climate negotiations could undermine global efforts to reduce dependence on fossil fuels, giving major polluters like China and India an excuse to scale back their own ambitions.

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