Lalo de Almeida (Sao Paulo, 1970) has dedicated a large part of his career as photojournalist to denounce and document abuses against Amazon. A work entitled ‘Amazon Dystopia’, which has led him to win the World Press Photo 2022 to the Long Term Project. Until December 11, the Center for Contemporary Culture of Barcelona (CCCB) hosts an exhibition with all the winning photographs of the prestigious award and De Almeida has visited Casa Seat this Friday to explain his vision of the reality of this region. Hours before the conference, she attended EL PERIÓDICO.
In an interview he has commented that Brazilians know more about the US than the Amazon. What is this region and what does it mean for Brazil?
Brazil is a continental country, of an enormous dimension, and the south has always been disconnected from the north, from the Amazon region. Southerners have never recognized it as part of their identity. They have treated it like a colony, where everything was extracted, wood, gold, energy, etc., without thinking about the people who live there, in environmental preservation. In fact, the environmental issue has never been a topic of debate in Brazil, not only about the Amazon, but in general. I think that is changing now. People are feeling the impact of the climate crisis and beginning to see the problem. When there is water rationing in São Paulo because it does not rain, they realize that it is due to deforestation and more and more voices cry out against the destruction of the Amazon. But culturally it is a very distant relationship. Traveling to the Amazon is expensive, most people from Brazil cannot travel and those who can prefer to go to Miami.
Does the school teach the wealth that having this region represents for the country?
Little bit. There is no conscience. This is changing because the world’s agenda is also changing. But there is no culture of protecting the Amazon. For many years, it has been considered a green desert, a wild place, with angry Indians, without valuing the indigenous culture, without talking about what it really is. There are 30 million people living in the Amazon, more than 500,000 indigenous people with very different cultures, it is of enormous wealth. And that is not transferred to the Brazilians, who have many prejudices with the indigenous issue and the culture of the Amazon.
In 2012 he started with the project awarded with the World Press Photo. How has the evolution of the Amazon been in this decade?
I started in 2012 with the construction of the Belo Monte hydroelectric plant. I went by chance to cover the issue for the newspaper I work for and when I started to see what was happening I understood the process of occupation of the Amazon. I saw with my own eyes what I had read in the history books, how those processes were being repeated, that way of treating the Amazon as a colony, the same for 500 years. I became aware of the social and environmental impacts. Belo Monte was my starting point to start photographing other projects, other occupation processes, such as the Transamazon highway. Around him are all kinds of crimes and illegalities, the search for gold, the illegal extraction of wood…
What did the arrival of Jair Bolsonaro mean to the Government of Brazil in 2019?
The process of destruction did not start with Bolsonaro, but he stepped on the accelerator. He completely destroyed the environmental control agencies, the agencies that take care of the indigenous populations, and his speech was very damaging. He sees the environment as an obstacle to development. And he has led people living in the Amazon to greatly increase illegal activities. These people feel empowered, as if they had a safe-conduct to do whatever they want. If the president supports me, who will be against it, they wonder.
And what is the modus operandi of these people?
In most cases, they are local politicians who have money to invest and take advantage of poverty and cheap labor. It is somewhat the same logic as drug trafficking, which takes advantage of cheap, young labor, with no prospects for the future, who find in this a means of survival. Most of the workers are poor, illiterate people who live in a regime of almost slavery. In reality, the problem in the Amazon is not environmental, it is social. If we don’t solve the poverty issue, this will go on forever.
Is the Lula government going to be able to reverse all this damage?
I think that at least the government is going to point in the right direction. But it’s not going to be a change overnight, it’s going to be a long process. These four years, Bolsonaro has managed to implant this mentality in the people who are there. He has managed to completely reverse the values. Government agencies that were there to protect the environment or indigenous communities are seen as enemies of the people. The same goes for journalists. Instead, the people who commit these crimes are seen as bringing development to the region. That is why the new government should not go for a control model that closes illegal businesses and leaves people without a livelihood, we must look for a different model that brings income to people who live in the jungle. Otherwise we are just going to be shooting blind, perpetuating something that will never end. But I think Lula is going to change everything. In fact, during the eight years that he governed, it was the period in which deforestation in Brazil decreased the most.
Have you had problems doing your job due to the accusation against journalists?
In the last four years the situation has become very tense, not only with the press, there was much more conflict in general. After working for many years in the Amazon, there began to be places where it was no longer feasible to go. I started to protect myself by avoiding some situations. And I remember once I had to run away because a Bolsonarista was chasing me with a machete for taking a picture of his truck loaded with illegal wood. He did not know that I was a journalist, he thought he was a worker for an NGO, another mortal enemy of Bolsonaro. And he came out after me yelling “oenegero, son of a bitch.”
How did you experience the election day last Sunday?
I almost die. It was like a nightmare. In the first round it seemed that Lula was going to win, she had a chance. She did not win but many Bolsonaro politicians, deputies, senators, were elected to the chambers. The most conservative people, the most crazy, were chosen. We spent a month suffering. On election day I was just recovering from covid and I spent 10 hours sitting in front of the television following the count minute by minute. When Lula’s victory became known, it was a great relief.
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Do you think the country has ended up divided in two?
Yes, totally. What scares the most is not that there is a madman like Bolsonaro, but that half of the country supports that madman.