"A Waterway Project in Brazil Imperils a Vast Tropical Wetland", 26 May 2022

...Pantanal, the world’s largest tropical wetland, traveling on its main body of water, the Paraguay River...

...With the rapid growth of industrial soybean farming in the Pantanal, a proposal to build a commercial waterway has been revived, with three ports — coupled with major dredging and course-alteration projects — planned for the Paraguay River....All three are being privately funded...

...Critics say the scope of the proposed Paraguay River project is so extensive that it would irretrievably damage the Pantanal....

Early this year, a federal judge...ruled that the environmental impact report for the project was severely inadequate, riddled with errors and lacking proper geographical knowledge of the region and analysis from qualified experts...It’s unclear which way the courts will go, but experts worry that the anti-environment policies of nationalist President Jair Bolsonaro — coupled with the power of soybean interests — may seep into judicial decisions...

In 2021, under Bolsonaro, a much larger project was launched, with the National Department of Transportation Infrastructure — under pressure from soybean growers along the Paraguay River — approving a major increase in dredging...

...Planning several ports and asking for individual licenses to build them, she says, creates a loophole that effectively allows the entire waterway to be built without proper environmental licensing and inspections looking at the broader, cumulative impact of the individual projects...

...While reengineering the curves would save agrobusinesses time and money, it would also cause irreparable damage to the habitats of the thousands of species, changing the course of the river and the ability of wildlife to return to the same spots to reproduce, rest, and feed...