Billions of dollars' worth of gold continue to be extracted illegally from Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, according to a Greenpeace study, despite President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s pledges to curb wildcat mining.
Lula pledged in 2023 to eliminate illegal gold mining from Indigenous lands and protected areas after years of expansion under far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro. Last year, Brazil’s Federal Police seized a record 447kg of illegally mined gold.
The Greenpeace study found that miners are adapting to the crackdown by using permits from areas with no mining activity to falsify the origin of gold.
Researchers analysed 187 forest areas near Indigenous lands and protected areas that had been issued mining permits by Brazil’s National Mining Agency (ANM). They found that 98 of these areas showed no signs of active mining.
Despite this, so-called "ghost permits" were used to justify the sale of 26.8 metric tonnes of gold, worth an estimated $3.88 billion, between 2018 and March 2026.
Investigators believe much of this gold is extracted from protected and Indigenous areas, including the Kayapó territory in Pará state.
Kayapó chief Megaron Txucarramae criticised the government’s failure to halt illegal mining.
“I don’t know what else is needed to solve illegal mining on Indigenous land,” he said. “It destroys the land, pollutes the rivers, and Indigenous people, without realising it, end up eating poisoned fish.”
In response, the ANM said it was monitoring the permits identified by Greenpeace for possible irregularities.
“With thousands of permits issued, the Amazon region imposes large-scale logistical and oversight challenges,” the agency added.
Record-high gold prices amid global geopolitical instability continue to drive illegal mining, creating new loopholes that make enforcement more difficult.
Environmentalists warn that without stricter oversight, the Amazon’s fragile ecosystems and Indigenous communities will continue to bear the brunt of the gold rush.
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