Brazil currently has around 20% of all the world’s biodiversity. There are more than 116 thousand species of fauna and more than 46 thousand of flora concentrated in the national territory, says the secretary of biodiversity of the Ministry of the Environment (MMA) and interviewee of the program The Voice of Brazil this Friday (4), Beatriz Millet.
In the conversation, Millet mentions the actions that the government has been planning to protect this biodiversity. Among them is the signing, a year ago, of the Nagoya Protocol, which regulates access and sharing of benefits, both monetary and non-monetary, of the genetic resources of biodiversity. According to her, the ratification by Brazil of this instrument guarantees legal certainty for Brazil as well as for the other 130 signatories of the agreement. The secretary explains that, with the protocol, the countries that access the genetic heritage of our biodiversity are committed to following the legislation and regulations.
Protocola also reduces the risk of what is called biopiracy. “The countries that suffer the most [com a biopirataria] are those that have a more exuberant biodiversity, like ours”, says Millet. According to her, just as the protocol establishes compliance with the legislation and regulations of the country that holds the heritage, it ends up reducing the chances of this type of crime.
The secretary also spoke about the sharing of profits from biodiversity for the benefit of conservation and research and action plans for the conservation of endangered species and those threatened with extinction.
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