The Amazon Summit is back after 14 years


The eight Amazon nations (Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela) signed the Belem Declaration this week to protect the Amazon, during their first Amazon Summit in 14 years.

The Amazon is huge – it’s 87% the size of the contiguous United States. Deforestation has already claimed about 17% of it – the size of France. And lately it’s been losing an area roughly the size of Jamaica each year.

The main deforestation driver is agriculture (cattle / soy), enabled by:

  • 🤷 A lack of government presence across much of the ecosystem
  • 🤨 Limited cooperation in the region after years of low trust
  • 👨‍🌾 A general urgency to generate local jobs and development, and
  • 🥩 Huge global demand for goods produced on Amazon land.

So there were high hopes for this Summit (particularly with Brazil’s new president as host), but the results look pretty mixed:

  • 🏞️ There was no firm pact to end deforestation (one key hold-out was Bolivia, which sees agriculture as a way to tackle poverty)
  • 🛢️ And there was no agreement to end new oil exploration (Brazil is mulling a possible new project near the mouth of the Amazon).

Instead, the nations signed the 10,000-word Belem Declaration (the summit took place in the Brazilian city of Belem). It pledges more work on issues like law enforcement and indigenous rights, and leaves each country to set their own deforestation goals.

Intrigue’s take: These kinds of international summits are hard (we’ve done them!). But this outcome exposes a couple of divisions, both within the Amazon region, and between the region and the broader world.

Regionally, the division partly looks like this: if Brazil (home to two thirds of the Amazon) has already built a lucrative industry with Amazon land, why can’t we?

And globally, it looks a bit like this: if the Amazon is significant for the whole world, why are we and our economies left to shoulder this burden alone? 

So the most promising ideas ahead will probably be the ones that best address these two divisions.

Also worth noting:

  • Brazil will host the 2025 UN Climate Conference (COP30).
  • Deforestation has dropped up to 66% since Brazilian President Lula took office. At this week’s summit, Ecuador’s president suggested reforesting Amazonian pastureland (much of which is in Brazil).
Latest Author Articles
IS AUKUS dead?

The historic AUKUS (Aus, UK, US) defence tech pact is in the news again, with Aussie outlets flagging the Trump administration might revise the deal, years after the ink dried.  Revealed via a shock 2021 announcement, the trilateral deal pledges varying defence tech cooperation, but the kicker was to help Australia get nuclear-powered (not armed) […]

11 July, 2025
Another coup in Thailand?

You’re chatting away on the phone after a crappy few weeks at work: yep, Jenny from accounts is at it again, and don’t even get us started on Barry from marketing. So you vent, throw a little shade, maybe sprinkle in some spice — it’s a private call. You do you, right? Wrong.  Thailand’s prime […]

2 July, 2025
Why the world is having fewer babies

Why are a bunch of ex-diplomats talking about babies and birth rates? Sure, it’s like a mango sorbet palate-cleanser amid all the war and rumours of war. But natality is also one of those slow-moving forces that can completely transform our world. How? Last century, the dominant narrative was that populations were too big, with leaders in China, Vietnam […]

11 June, 2025
Xi and Trump talk for the first time

Sometimes, the shortest press releases generate the most headlines.   Take Thursday’s press release from China’s state broadcaster: “Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday held phone talks with U.S. President Donald Trump at the latter’s request.”  As you’d expect, given the feverish geopolitical climate of today, those 18 words were enough to trigger a visceral reaction in any US-China […]

6 June, 2025