The First to Die

So they holler on about the end of the world in the hope of making us give up on our dreams. My main reason for postponing the end of the world is so we’ve always got time for one more story. If we can make time for that, then we’ll be forever putting off the world’s demise.
Ailton Krenak — Ideas to Postpone the End of the World

This insight from the Brazilian Indigenous leader, environmentalist, philosopher, poet, and writer Ailton Krenak refers to the existence of hundreds of traditional cultures that have been surviving for thousands of years in balance with the Earth’s natural cycles, with worldviews that do not set human beings apart from nature, but rather see them in continuity with one another. Objectively, Krenak advocates for the end of capitalism and the commodification of nature and life, so we can finally restore this balance. He also provides suggestions for actions to tackle the authoritarian state, fascist ideology, colonialism, and the fanaticism of denial.

His ideas prove to be fundamental today, as climate change becomes a concrete risk for life on Earth and sparks questions about how Brazilian people live in cities. As Krenak argues, we cannot look away from the destructive effects of the capitalist economic model.

Extreme climate events have become increasingly common in urban areas where population density has been on the rise — like the unprecedented floods that started on 29 April 2024 and for more than 20 days have been devastating 469 cities in Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil’s southernmost state), affecting more than 2,345,400 people and leading to a death toll that is still rising. Intense environmental catastrophes are showing how the Brazilian state has been unable to coordinate adaptation strategies and contingency plans, especially in cities.

One example is the retaining infrastructure around the Guaíba Lake in Rio Grande do Sul’s capital, Porto Alegre, with 68 kilometres of dykes, a pumping system, and 14 floodgates that were set up in 1960. For lack of maintenance, and as the water levels of the rivers that flow into the Guaíba were expected to rise rapidly, its automated system had to be hoisted up and welded; still, one of the floodgates broke and part of the city was flooded.

The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) illustrated the phenomenon of urban population concentration in its most recent census in 2022, finding that more than half of the country’s 203 million people (or 54.8 percent) live within 150 kilometres of the coast, while 41 percent live further inland, and only 4 percent live near the border with other countries.

Real Estate Speculation and Gentrification

The areas along the coastline where most people live experience constant conflicts with real estate speculation. In the case of the centre of São Paulo, 1 in every 5 houses is empty. This happens because real estate’s logic of maximizing profits encourages owners of quality buildings to leave them vacant as they wait for price increases or better deals. Meanwhile, 64,000 people were homeless in the city in 2023, a number 16 times higher than it was 10 years ago.

As populations living on the outskirts are most impacted by extreme climate events or meteorological irregularities, they are the ones suffering the most and also the first to die.

At the same time, there are also gentrification policies that force poor populations out of economic centres, where there is more urban infrastructure, to the outskirts, where there are not even minimal conditions for survival, like sanitation systems, safe housing, or jobs. These are areas with poor housing, which is more subject to the effects of catastrophes caused by extreme climate events.

In Brazilian cities, most public investment has historically been allocated to the rich and central areas of the cities. Priority regarding infrastructure, parks, tree planting, planning, and adequate roads is given to these areas. This is why it is false to claim that climate disasters, which happen more often on the outskirts, are due to allegedly riskier geological aspects. The truth is that areas on the outskirts have inferior urban development compared to rich neighbourhoods, precisely because of the lack of public investment. These areas have more houses with potential structural vulnerabilities and more precarious housing.

People in the Outskirts Are the First to Die

Another important data point regarding populations who live on the outskirts is regarding the length of their lives. The survey 2023 Inequality Map conducted by the Nossa São Paulo Network shows that residents of the outskirts of the city die up to 23 years earlier than people who live in central neighbourhoods and around economic centres. The average age of death in upper-class neighbourhoods, like Jardim Paulista or Itaim Bibi, is 82, while in Anhanguera, a neighbourhood in the westernmost area of the city, it’s only 59.

According to the Nossa São Paulo Network, this data reveals the effects of inequality on the population, where children and young people are more exposed to territory-related vulnerabilities, while older adults have their longevity reduced due to a lack of conditions for a good quality of life in old age. Neighbourhoods on the outskirts with lower life expectancy struggle with high population density, a lack of public infrastructure, and a lack of basic sanitation systems. These are also areas struggling with a shortage of doctors and other healthcare professionals.

Covid, Dengue, and Other Diseases

As populations living on the outskirts are most impacted by extreme climate events or meteorological irregularities, they are the ones suffering the most and also the first to die. When it comes to pandemics and epidemics, which are often linked to climate change, consider the first victim who died of COVID-19 in Brazil: Cleonice Gonçalves, a 63-year-old Black woman who was a domestic worker and was infected with the virus by her employers on their return from a trip to Italy. Since then, more than 700,000 people have died due to COVID-19, and most of them (55 percent) were Black people, according to the IBGE.

Today, early May 2024, we are facing a dengue epidemic across Brazil, with more than 4 million cases, 2,197 confirmed deaths, and 2,000 deaths under investigation. The virus is transmitted by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which are finding better breeding conditions due to the cycle of rains, standing water, and warm weather, when their eggs hatch more quickly. These findings are from a study by researchers Antonio Carlos Oscar Júnior of Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ) and Francisco de Assis Mendonça of Paraná Federal University (UFPR), who estimate that we will see the disease spreading more often, as the proliferation of mosquitoes has been increasing even during the winter due to the increasing occurrence of heatwaves and erratic rainfall patterns.

The simple way of living of populations on the outskirts has less impact on the environment, but these populations are rendered invisible or treated as chronic problems of the social system.

Other diseases associated with climate change are infectious diseases, including leishmaniasis, malaria, and other arboviral diseases, as well as hepatitis, which is waterborne and therefore occurs more often in areas lacking basic sanitation systems. This is the case of a stilt housing community in the city of São Vicente, on the coast of São Paulo state. A group of nearly 20,000 precarious wooden homes built over flooded areas, the community houses families living in vulnerable conditions who are, therefore, extremely stigmatized.

“Society blames stilt-house dwellers for the waste around them, but the waste is carried there by the ocean. How can people who don’t have enough to eat afford expensive products? There are waste packages of imported goods. It’s all coming from the water”, 50-year-old community leader Fran L’eraistre argues, adding that the destruction of local mangrove areas is perpetrated by corporations and rich property owners aiming to build tourism resorts. As mangroves are buried, floods hit the community more often. The power and irregularity of tides also impact the community, which lacks infrastructure. The most serious topic is the intense heatwaves that make life in the precarious shacks almost unbearable.

“Water and electric power supply is irregular in the community. We only have water supply for a few hours a day, so we have to store it — and the quality is really bad. This has been causing a lot of diseases in children and adults too. Health care professionals are saying that viral diseases are transmitted by poor-quality water”, L’eraistre says. She believes the solution for the community can only come from a long-term project co-conducted between the federal, state, and municipal governments, and that allows for the active participation of the community.

Flooding the Outskirts

The coast of São Paulo state is a good portrait of systemic contradictions, where there is a concentration of properties owned by a very well-off elite that wants to enjoy beautiful natural sights while living in the same area as extremely vulnerable populations, like Vila Sahy, in the city of São Sebastião, where the domestic workers who serve in rich houses and businesses live. On 19 February 2023, a huge storm destroyed the city, but especially this poor, marginalized area. Dozens of homes were destroyed by the huge volume of water, which caused a landslide that displaced huge rocks. The death toll reached 65, most of whom were Black people. According to the local city government, the victims were 25 adult men, 22 adult women, and 17 children. Only 1.5 kilometres away, a nearby upper-class area by the shore suffered material damages but no one died.

The concept of environmental racism gains specific meanings in Brazil when we consider its broader context of social inequality and environmental protection needs. The concept was coined by Benjamin Chavis in the civil rights struggle in the United States, and it addresses the race-based discrimination that happens when applying and enforcing environmental policies. In the Brazilian context, in terms of institutional aspects it refers to policies, practices, or directives which have different effects or lead to disadvantages for Black and Latin communities. It means “the stratification of people (by race, ethnicity, social status, and power) and places (in cities, peripheral neighbourhoods, rural areas, Indigenous reserves, Candomblé terreiros (houses), Quilombola communities, and traditional shell-fishing and fishing communities)”, as researchers Julio Cesar de Sá da Rocha and Diosmar Marcelino Santana Filho wrote in a paper in 2008. “Their work environment itself shows a disproportionately high exposure of certain categories of workers to unhealthy work and safety conditions.”

While many communities are persecuted and oppressed in the name of the conservation of hillsides and green areas, environmental legislation is applied differently when it comes to big commercial or public developments. Dozens of environmental tragedies have happened and the courts do not hold accountable any of the executives or conglomerates that benefit from criminal businesses, including landfills, major real estate projects built on protected areas, petrol station chains, or others. The simple way of living of populations on the outskirts has less impact on the environment, but these populations are rendered invisible or treated as chronic problems of the social system.

A survey by Agência Pública looked into data from the São Paulo city Civil Defence agency and found that the ten districts with the largest number of reported floods have a higher-than-average Black population. The districts of Jardim Helena (which alone has 2,000 reported cases of floods in ten years), Vila Jacuí, and São Miguel Paulista are areas on the outskirts near Tietê River located upstream of the Penha dam, that controls the river’s flow. In many situations, a deliberate decision is made between flooding the city centre or the neighbourhoods on the outskirts. Some homes remain flooded for weeks, and it is not uncommon for residents to lose all their belongings during the wet season.

Droughts Affect Food Security

In contrast to excessive rains, droughts are also dramatically hitting the metropolitan area of São Paulo. It happened, for example, in 2014, when the Cantareira System, which has 5 dams in the northern area of São Paulo and supplies 9 million people, dried up and had to operate by tapping water from its so-called “dead storage” — its last, poor-quality water supply. At the time, water supplies and emergency construction works had to be strictly limited to avoid a collapse in the city. Local businesses struggled to operate as usual, and the changes in the landscape of slums and neighbourhoods on the outskirts were easy to spot. Little by little, every small home got one or more water tanks — all of them blue, thousands of them. As water was supplied for a limited period of time and got to their taps only for a few hours, people had to store it to survive during these times of rationing.

More than ever, we need to critically reconsider the model of our cities.

The lack of rainfall has also been affecting poor communities’ food security in Brazil. Low rainfall prevents seeds from germinating, while excessive rainfall also causes crop losses. Irregular rain cycles result in problems for common crops, pushing food prices up and also leading to shortages and hunger. The Brazilian government has not been able to restore its public food stocks in 2024 precisely because of the low yields and high prices of previous years.

Data from the Brazilian Continuous National Household Sample Survey (Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios Contínua, or PNAD Contínua) show that 64.2 million people are classified as experiencing some degree of food insecurity (mild, moderate, or severe) in 2023. As climate phenomena are expected to hit crops more severely in the coming years, this is an extra concern amid an already complicated overall scenario.

The Danger of Urban Heat

The unpredictability of extreme events has led Brazil’s National Meteorology Institute (INMET), which monitors the country’s climate, to launch an issue of Brazil’s Climatological Normals 1991–2020, aiming to identify climate changes through 1931–1960, 1961–1990, and 1981–2010. The data show that the past 10 years deserve special attention due to the large number of extreme precipitation events above 100 millimetres per hour, which means high risk of floods.

Extreme events are also concerning when we talk about air quality and its impacts on human health. Research shows that periods of intense cold and heat are directly linked to mortality, especially affecting people over 65 years old who live in big cities. Research by Sara Lopes de Moraes of the University of São Paulo assessed the link between these events and the urban heat island effect, a phenomenon where temperatures tend to be higher in urban areas than in rural or suburban areas, and also considered the socio-economic context, using three analysis classes: low income, middle class, and high income. The results of her investigation show that the heat-related mortality rate among those aged 65 and older in the 2014 heatwave was 22.8 percent in low-income areas, but only 16.1 percent in high-income areas.

A New Model

More than ever, we need to critically reconsider the model of our cities, to change the model of society with a broad investment programme for the outskirts, including wastewater collection and treatment, urban planning, and “housing first”, a central demand made by Brazil’s National Homeless Movement. This means a new urbanization pattern that must be linked to the development of complementary urban infrastructure, with road adjustments, public transportation, and the multiplication of green areas including parks and ecological corridors. The manifesto “A Call for an Eco-Social Transition in Brazil”, launched in 2021 by a group of activist thinkers, proposes this new model of the city and consumption, with urgent proposals for the radical defence of life. This transition must be built collectively, by listening to the communities and directing public investment to those who need it most.