Brazil 2025: Every day a different 7-1! July 23, 2025. OPINION

Pixabay Image. Soccer field and Brazilian flag.

Brazil 2025: Every day a different 7-1!

From a soccer defeat to an environmental tragedy—why does Brazil continue to ignore the warning signs?

The year was 2014. I was in my third year of college, doing a summer internship at a guanandi plantation (Callophylum brasiliense), a native medicinal and timber species. I was learning, hands-on, how to productively manage a Brazilian species conservation through use.

I was happy.

Finishing work early to return to my dorm, have a beer, eat some popcorn, and watch Brazil in a World Cup semifinal. I'd venture to say that this was the definition of a happy afternoon for every Brazilian who, like me, witnessed the golden age of Brazilian soccer.

What could go wrong?

First goal in the 11th minute.

The second at 23.

24. 26. 29. 69. 79. Five more goals.

Seeing the hopes of reaching the final and winning the sixth World Cup crumble hurt deeply. It hurt every Brazilian who watched, and it hurt those who heard the result. It hurt even future generations.

Eleven years later, I experience a similar pain, but amplified and with consequences far worse than losing the sixth.

2025. Brazil was chosen to host COP30, one of the largest and most important global events addressing the environment and climate. A conference where global leaders debate and sign agreements to mitigate and reverse global environmental degradation (or should).

As Brazil prepares to host world leaders at COP30 and pose as an example of climate leadership, internally it is dismantling its environmental protection mechanisms: in 2025, the Brazilian legislature approved, through multiple instances, a bill affectionately nicknamed by those in technical and academic circles as the "devastation bill."

Unlike soccer, this 7-1 defeat came in the early hours of the morning. Congress acted silently, like a predator.

Brazil truly has a short memory: we barely completed 40 years of the "Valley of Death" and the implementation of techniques to mitigate the harmful effects of projects on the environment and society, and we failed to pass a bill that relaxes the monitoring and control mechanisms for these projects.

And I don't know what to expect from a Brazil where part of the population discredits vaccines because they are "the product of the interests of the pharmaceutical industry"; But at the same time, it firmly believes that polluting enterprises will implement appropriate controls to prevent pollution from reaching degrading levels – even after experiencing Brumadinho, Mariana, and Braskem in the recent past. Worse still: I don't know what to expect from a Brazil where decision-makers want people to believe this.

Brazil forgets all the 7-1 defeats that directly and daily impact our lives.

The only 7-1 defeat that remains in our memory, unfortunately, is soccer.

SDG 16, SDG 17

Ana Letícia de Rodrigues Ferro

Forestry Engineer (FCA/UNESP Botucatu)

Ecology Specialist (FAMEESP)

Environmental Analyst (Irrigart Engineering and Consulting in Water Resources and Environment)

Corporate email: leticia@irrigart.com.br