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Brasilia – Brazil is struggling to control mercury releases to the wild and to eliminate the use of mercury in some industry sectors, according to a study by WWF and the US Brazil, published Saturday (8). Contact with the liquid metal is harmful to the environment and human health and can damage the nervous, digestive and immune systems.
The study was conducted in partnership with the United Nations Environment Program and indicates that scientific research has already identified the contamination of humans and fish in the environment. 39; environment. Amazon. Last year, one of the WWF studies found that 81% of fish caught in the Amapá region, in Tumucumaque National Park, were contaminated with mercury.
The investigation also revealed that the mercury concentration found in the samples exceeded the allowable limits. World Health Organization (WHO). In the research area, mercury is used in the extraction of gold, small-scale activity at the Brazilian border with Suriname and French Guiana. Illegal logging has also resulted in contamination of Yanomami Indians in other areas of the North.
Populations in other parts of the country are also at risk, especially when four chlor-alkali plants still use mercury and remain. in stock about 200 tons of metal.
Convention
Brazil is part of the so-called Minamata Convention, an international agreement that limits the use of mercury. Minamata is the name of the Japanese city where about 900 people died and 5,000 were contaminated with the substance after consuming fish from an bay receiving mercury waste from a PVC plant.
The event occurred at the beginning of the last century. In 2013, also in Japan, the Convention was signed by 140 countries, including Brazil. The Brazilian government promulgated the country's accession to the convention in August this year and is committed to meeting the goals of phasing out projects by 2020.
Countries Signatories to the convention should identify existing stocks of the substance on their territory and ban the production and trade of metal by 2020. Products such as batteries, lamps, cosmetics, pesticides or amalgam used for dental restorations and equipment such as thermometers and pressure vessels, among others, should eliminate the use of mercury during of this period.
The country's commitments were reaffirmed at the second conference.
Decrease in Imports
Although Brazil does not produce metallic mercury, the country imported within 10 years (before ratification). more than 88 tons of the substance. The countries that export the most metals are Spain, the United States, the United Kingdom, Kyrgyzstan and Japan.
Data from the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama). , responsible for the control of the mercury trade in the country and the granting of the metal import license, show that imports rose from 210.2 tons (in the early 2000s) to 51, 7 tons between 2014 and 2016.
In March of this year, Ibama and the federal government prevented a dental company, considered the largest mercury importer in the country, located in Joinville, from receiving a mercury volume from Brazil . 1.7 tons of metal. Part of the proceeds would be intended for illegal mining. The seizure occurring in the port of Itajaí was the second most important carried out by IBAMA
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