For the last 150 years Brazil has been the world’s greatest producer of coffee and now said to produce 40% of the world’s coffee, which is big business.
Coffee plantations are reported to cover 27000 square kilometres and are mainly situated in Minas Gerais, Sao Paulo and Parana; all areas that have been in the media recently regarding multiple fires. A thousand fires have been started in Parana this summer. Unknown organisations have been blamed but Nasa have reported that the fires have been started by farmers as maintenance for their land and to clear the land for pasture, which seems unfeasible.
The 35th President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva attempted to banish the hunger and extreme poverty that still existed in Brazil with the introduction of programs that provided financial aid and by trying to provide affordable food and cisterns for clean water. His government also introduced farming subsidies for family farms and small government loans.
He was imprisoned for 12 years in 2018 on corruption charges that are not substantiated and stated in court that he was being subject to unlawful imprisonment.
President Jair Bolsonaro has been president since january of this year and succeeded Michel Temer who was also arrested, on march of this year, for alleged activity involving Petrobras, the multimillion dollar Brazilian oil company. He was accused of seĺling to foreign contractors at inflated prices. Petrobras is said to be worth over 251 billion and is rated the 58th richest company in the world.