Prosecutor’s Office asks for annulment of Pontal do Paraná container terminal

A recommendation from the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Paraná and the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office issued this Thursday, March 21st, seeks to annul an environmentally irregular license granted by IBAMA to a container terminal in Pontal do Paraná, on the coast of the state. According to investigations by the Public Prosecutors’ Offices, the initial license for the terminal’s operation expired last year and was renewed for another six years without following the regular procedures required for such renewal.

The signatories of the recommendation allege that “the licensing process is ‘rushing’ through important issues, without allowing for reflection and without considering the seriousness of the impacts and damages that will occur to the environment and Traditional Communities.”

The document points out various irregularities in the licensing process, including the lack of authorization for forest clearance, uncertainties about the terminal’s vehicle access routes, inconsistencies in the minimum and maximum depths of the terminal’s berths, and insufficient information regarding the required environmental compensation for the impact on native vegetation, among other issues.

The Public Prosecutors’ Offices recommend to IBAMA “the annulment of the Installation License, to rectify the identified irregularities, requiring that they be adequately addressed by the contractor before the authorization of the project (through the granting of an installation license).”

Preservation of the Atlantic Forest – The institutions have been working together to prevent environmentally harmful activities on the coast of Paraná, which could have tragic future consequences. The region is part of the Atlantic Forest Reserve and is included in the extremely high-priority area for conservation by the Ministry of the Environment, covered by coastal woodlands, mangroves, archaeological sites, indigenous lands, and caiçara territories.

“The preservation of the biodiversity of the Atlantic Forest, in addition to protecting thousands of species of fauna and flora, performs multiple and indispensable environmental functions, on which at least 150 million Brazilians depend,” warn the Public Prosecutors in the document, citing some of these functions that are essential for environmental balance, such as the supply of drinking water, soil stability control, thermal control, control of more extreme rainfall, sea level rise, and other catastrophic events, among many others that justify the need for a permanent fight for its preservation.

Source: Ministério Público do Paraná

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