Brazilian authorities failed to release recent rates concering dramatic deforestation levels in the Amazon ahead of the COP26 Climate Change Conference in Glasgow that ended on 12 November, the Associated Press has reported, citing two Brazilian ministers.
Several days before the summit Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro reportedly met with several ministers and decided not to reveal findings demonstrating deforestation in excess of 20 percent in Brazil over 2020 and 2021 until the conference ended.
One of the participants said that the decision was "a strategy to recover environmental credibility abroad".
The undisclosed data shows that the Amazon region lost 5,100 square miles of rainforest from August 2020 to July 2021, which is the worst rate in the last 15 years.
The statistics from the country's National Institute for Space Research was released on Thursday.
During the COP26 summit, hundreds of countries, including Canada, Brazil, China, Indonesia, the US, the UK, and Russia agreed to end deforestation in eight years. The agreement stipulated the allocation of $20 billion for this purpose from states and private companies. A portion of the funds are expected to be directed to combating forest fires and restoring already damaged areas.