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Brazil’s government says deforestation rates in the country’s Amazon and savanna regions have fallen to record lows ahead of a presidential election run-off in which the rainforest’s future is a key issue.

Left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, when he assumed office three years ago, pledged to end deforestation by 2030 in the Amazon. It had surged under his right-wing predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro.

Lula will face Bolsonaro’s son Flavio in the run-off on 25 October, with polls suggesting a neck-and-neck race. Flavio is expected to continue his father’s policies if he wins, though he has pledged to fight organised crime in the Amazon.

Satellite data shows that in the year to July 2026, the deforestation rate fell by 41.8% in the Amazon – the biggest drop since records began in 1988. The fall in the Cerrado, Brazil’s savanna region, was 23.8%.

The Amazon rainforest – the world’s largest – is a crucial buffer in the global fight against climate change and 60% of it is located in Brazil.

Jair Bolsonaro promoted mining in indigenous lands in the Amazon and forest clearances soared at the same time as resources to protect the forest were cut.

During Bolsonaro’s presidency from 2019 to 2022, the Amazon lost nearly 60% more in forest lands compared to the previous four years, news agency AFP reported, citing official data.

Lula reversed his policies and oversaw deforestation rates drop to a six-year low during his first year in office. Lula tightened up environmental monitoring and penalties for illegal logging.

“Our goal is to achieve zero illegal deforestation by 2030,” he said in a post on X on Friday.

Tropical rainforests like the Amazon are home to millions of species. In a healthy state, they absorb vast quantities of planet-warming carbon dioxide, helping to keep the Earth cool.

But they have come under increasing pressure from decades of deliberate land clearance for agriculture and logging, as well as climate change, which scientists warn can create conditions for wildfires.

Brazil’s Environment Minister Joao Paulo Capobianco described the decline in Amazon deforestation as “absolutely stratospheric”.

It was an “historic achievement” for Brazil, said Marcio Astrini, executive secretary at climate advocacy group Observatorio do Clima.

It showed that “with political will, it is possible to curb deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions”, Astrini said.

Dopo anni di sfruttamento forsennato, la deforestazione dell’Amazzonia registrata ad aprile del 2023 è calata più della metà rispetto allo stesso periodo dell’anno precedente: da poco meno di 1000 chilometri quadrati abbattuti a 321. Nel primo quadrimestre 2023, secondo l’Inpe (l’Istituto Nazionale per la Ricerca Spaziale che ha raccolto i dati), l’area rasa al suolo è stata inferiore del 38% rispetto al 2022.

Otto Paesi dell’area amazzonica riuniti in Brasile hanno inoltre annunciato il lancio di una “alleanza” contro la deforestazione. Il presidente brasiliano Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva ha salutato l’accordo come un “punto di svolta” nella lotta contro il riscaldamento globale. La nascita della ”Alleanza amazzonica per combattere la deforestazione” è stata siglata a Belem da Brasile, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Perù, Suriname e Venezuela, ovvero dai Paesi dell’Organizzazione per il Trattato di Cooperazione Amazzonica (Otca) nata nel 1995 con l’obiettivo di preservare le foreste pluviali della regione, habitat per circa il 10% della biodiversità mondiale. L’obiettivo aggiornato è “evitare che l’Amazzonia raggiunga il punto di non ritorno”, ovvero che l’Amazzonia emetta più gas serra di quanto ne assorba.

Australia’s Daintree – the world’s oldest tropical rainforest – has been returned to its Aboriginal custodians in a historic deal.

The Unesco World Heritage site is over 180 million years old and has been home to generations of Aboriginal people.

The Eastern Kuku Yalanji people will now manage the national park with Queensland’s state government.

The Daintree borders the Great Barrier Reef and is one of Australia’s top tourism drawcards.

It is famed for its ancient ecosystem and rugged, natural beauty which includes forest vistas, wild rivers, waterfalls, gorges and white sandy beaches.

The deal also includes other Queensland national parks including Cedar Bay (Ngalba Bulal), Black Mountain (Kalkajaka) and Hope Islands – a combined area of over 160,000 hectares.

In handing formal ownership back to the Eastern Kuku Yalanji people on Wednesday, the Queensland government recognised “one of the world’s oldest living cultures”.

“This agreement recognises their right to own and manage their Country, to protect their culture, and to share it with visitors as they become leaders in the tourism industry,” said Environment Minister Meaghan Scanlon in a statement.

It followed four years of discussions, local media reported.

The Eastern Kuku Yalanji people wished to eventually solely manage the forests and other wet tropics regions, said negotiator Chrissy Grant.

“Bama [people] across the wet tropics have consistently lived within the rainforest. That in itself is something that is pretty unique to the world heritage listing,” she told Guardian Australia.

The agreement takes in both the Mossman Gorge and Cape Tribulation sides of the forest.

The Daintree region attained World Heritage listing in 1988, following a campaign in Canberra to push back against logging and agricultural clearing endorsed by the then state government.

Unesco recognises it as an “extremely important” site of rich and unique biodiversity, with over 3,000 plant species, 107 mammals, 368 bird and 113 reptile species.

The area is also the largest tract of land in Australia that has continuously persisted as a rainforest.

The Daintree contains the relicts of the great Gondwanan forests that covered Australia and parts of Antarctica before the continents split up 50 to 100 million years ago.

As such, the rainforest “presents an unparalleled record of the ecological and evolutionary processes that shaped the flora and fauna of Australia”, says Unesco.

“Its living flora, with the highest concentration of primitive, archaic and relict taxa known, is the closest modern-day counterpart for Gondwanan forests,” says the UN body.