In her third blog in the Amazon on the Brink series, LAB author and editor Sue Branford looks at the sharpening political divisions which threaten the efforts of relatively progressive governments in recent years in Colombia, Peru and Brazil to prioritize nature, halt extraction of oil and minerals and save the Amazon.
The survival of the Amazon forest is increasingly at risk as the countries that cover it are riven by profound political divisions. While leftist and centrist politicians tend to prioritize biodiversity protection, they are being challenged by far-right candidates who promise fast economic growth, whatever the environmental cost.
In Colombia, Abelardo de la Espriella, a Trump-admiring far-right millionaire whose views align with the far-right ideology of former president Álvaro Uribe, won the Colombian presidential election on 28 July. He narrowly defeated Iván Cepeda, who was endorsed by outgoing President Gustavo Petro, a former guerrilla and the country’s first leftist leader. De la Espriella received 49.66 per cent of the vote compared to Cepeda’s 48.70 per cent . It was the smallest margin ever recorded in a Colombian presidential election.
But this razor-thin majority may well be enough for De la Espriella to reverse many of Petro’s policies. Petro’s election programme had promised something few leaders of fossil fuel-producing countries had seriously attempted: to reduce his country’s dependence on the consumption and export of oil, gas and coal.
Together with his vice-president Francia Márquez, a former environmental activist, Petro had put together a plan to make Colombia less dependent on resource extraction. They had promised economic diversification, renewable energy, greater democratic control over energy systems, and environmental protection.
Reforms undermined
Four years on, now that Petro has left office, having served a single term, the maximum allowed under Colombian law, how successful was his government in achieving these ambitious goals?
The results are mixed. Many of its most ambitious reforms were undermined by political opposition, institutional inertia and the continuing importance to the country of fossil fuel revenues.
Even so, his government made important progress, particularly in renewable and community energy. When Petro was elected in 2022, non-hydro renewables provided less than 2 per cent of Colombia’s electricity generation capacity. By the end of 2025, that was up to 15 per cent, mostly thanks to heavy investment in solar.
The big jump in renewable energy might be the outgoing president’s single most tangible achievement on the climate front.
Moreover, Petro tried to democratize energy production, aware that local involvement is essential if the schemes are to prosper. He created community energy schemes targeted at regions affected by poverty, conflict or coal dependence. Some 18,000 groups expressed interest.
But despite all these initiatives, the state struggled to slow fossil fuel development. Petro’s administration pledged to ban fracking, halt new exploration licences for mining, oil, gas and coal, and remove a gasoline subsidy. The measures sparked strong resistance from the fossil industry.
The government was hampered by its lack of a majority in parliament, conflicts with the country’s Constitutional Court and political instability within Petro’s administration.
An important failure was Petro’s inability, despite multiple attempts, to pass a law to ban fracking. He also failed to remove new large-scale open-pit coal mining projects from the country’s national development plan.
In this context, it is not surprising that Petro’s administration frequently tried to slow down fossil fuel development using decrees or temporary decisions, such as declaring geographical zones where mining permits cannot be given.
Environmentalists fear that it will be relatively easy for De la Espriella, who takes office on 7 August, to overturn these measures. He has said he will prioritize expanding fossil fuel production, including fracking.
That experience matters far beyond Colombia. Across the global south, fossil fuel-producing countries must decide whether to continue to extract resources to fund development and the transition to low-carbon energy or begin moving away from extractive models altogether. Colombia provided one of the clearest tests yet of the second approach.
Peru and Brazil
In Peru, little progress was made in environmental protection, largely because of chronic political instability. Keiko Fujimori, who took office on 28 July 2026, is the ninth president in a decade. She has said that her government will focus on prioritizing rapid economic growth, particularly in the mining sector, over stringent environmental protection. Although it is too soon to judge her administration, this sounds ominous.
The survival of the Amazon forest depends in large part to the outcome of Brazil’s elections, scheduled for 4 October 2026. The current president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, is standing for re-election but his approval ratings are not as high as in previous years. His main opponent is Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, who is running neck-and-neck in the opinion polls.
As discussed in a previous blog, Lula has taken tough action to stop illegal deforestation in the Amazon forest. Even so, prospects this year are alarming. Scientists expect El Niño, a naturally occurring climate phenomenon driven by warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures in the Pacific, will intensify this year into a super El Niño, with ocean temperatures spiking at least 2 °C above normal.
It is expected to bring prolonged droughts, declining river levels, heightened wildfire risk, and increased hardship for local communities. It is difficult to predict the political impact of such a phenomenon.
To see the other blogs in this series, click here
Main image: Amazon deforestation. Photo Maritzilda Cruppe/Rede Amazônia Sustantável
