Welcome to Belém: Land of Açaí, Rainforest, and Hypocrisy

Belém is preparing to host the COP30 climate summit, and it wants to look its best. Streets are being cleaned, signs are being printed in three languages, and suddenly the city cares very deeply about bike lanes.

But beneath the surface of all this eco-glam lies a familiar stench. Not the aroma of Amazonian cuisine or the humid perfume of the rainforest—but something stronger: the smell of hypocrisy wrapped in a compostable bag.

Because while government officials boast about turning Belém into a global capital of sustainability, they're also backing a plan to dump garbage from the capital directly into or near quilombo lands—territories that belong to Afro-Brazilian communities descended from escaped enslaved people who have protected their ecosystems for generations.

Ah yes. Nothing says “climate justice” quite like burying literal trash on top of Black ancestral land. With state approval, of course.

Climate Colonialism, Now With Solar Panels

Let’s pause for a moment to appreciate the innovation: this isn’t your grandparents’ old-school colonialism. This is green colonialism—the kind where governments and corporations chant “net zero” while displacing traditional communities under the guise of progress.

The plan involves building new sanitary landfills near Bujaru and Acará, close to quilombola communities already under pressure from agribusiness, mining, and land grabbing. Water contamination? No problem. Environmental consultation? Not needed. Consent? Never heard of her.

The message is clear: the same communities that actually know how to live with the forest must be sacrificed so the rest of the world can post carbon-neutral selfies at COP30.

Zero Waste, 100% Disposability

You’d think that a climate summit held in the Amazon—the so-called lungs of the planet—would treat local stewards of the land with some respect. Instead, we get public works projects that produce more rubble than results.

Take Vila da Barca, for example. A community near the Guamá River where waste from construction tied to the summit—like a sewage pumping station—is being dumped without proper oversight. No environmental impact assessments. No clear benefits to residents. No accountability.

But hey, at least there will be "smart" lampposts lighting the path to COP30. Just don’t ask who had to move out of the way to install them.

The Invitation That Never Came

In March 2025, the president of COP30 released a grand public letter calling for collaboration, dialogue, and inclusion. There was one thing missing: any mention of quilombos. The omission didn’t go unnoticed.

CONAQ (Coordenação Nacional de Articulação das Comunidades Negras Rurais Quilombolas) and other organizations issued public responses, condemning their exclusion from planning conversations that directly impact their lives and lands.

For a conference that claims to center “climate justice,” it’s a glaring oversight. Or maybe not an oversight at all. When justice becomes a hashtag instead of a process, the most inconvenient voices are always the first to be silenced.

Resistance Grows in the Soil

Here’s where the optimism kicks in—not the performative kind, but the real kind. The kind that grows in hard soil and refuses to die.

Quilombo leaders aren’t backing down. Fábio Nogueira of the Malungu Federation said it best:

“We will not allow the capital’s garbage to be buried on top of our history. This is a massacre.”

These communities are already organizing resistance, filing legal complaints, and making sure international eyes stay fixed on the injustice unfolding behind COP30’s green curtain. The same land that Brazil is trying to use as a landfill is the land where these communities have practiced sustainable living for centuries.

They don’t need a conference to learn how to live with the forest—they are the conference we’ve all been waiting for.

Recyclable Narratives, Disposable Lives?

So what is COP30 really about?

Is it a chance to shift global climate policy? Possibly.
Is it a shiny PR stunt for political elites and polluting industries to greenwash their crimes? Absolutely.
Can it be both? Tragically, yes.

But here's the real question: How many quilombo communities have to be erased before the world realizes that protecting the planet doesn’t mean destroying its people?

Until then, we’ll keep getting landfill policies dressed up in sustainability jargon, and photoshoots with Indigenous headpieces worn by ministers who’ve never set foot in a maloca.

The Only Sustainable Solution Is Justice

It’s not enough to plant trees while bulldozing communities. It’s not enough to pledge carbon neutrality while paving over lives. Climate solutions without racial and territorial justice are just another form of extraction.

So if you’re heading to Belém for COP30, bring your reusable water bottle. But maybe also bring a conscience.

Better yet, instead of speaking for the Amazon, start listening to the people who live there—and stop dumping your problems on top of them.

Because in the end, climate justice isn’t about saving the rainforest. It’s about saving the people who never tried to destroy it in the first place.