Case Name: Defensoria Pública do Estado do Pará e outros vs. RMDLT Property Group e outros (Project 997 on carbon credits and "forest carbon illegality")

Summary

This is a Public Civil Action (ACP) with a request for urgent relief filed by the Public Defender's Office of the State of Pará (DPE-PA) against RMDLT Property Group Ltda, Brazil Property Group Compra, Venda e Locação de Imóvel Ltda, Brazil Agfor LLC, Agfor Empreendimentos Ltda, Michael Edward Greene, and the municipality of Portel, due to projects generating illegal carbon credits sold on the voluntary market. This ACP is part of a set of 4 actions filed by the DPE-PA with the same grounds, but questioning different carbon credit projects. The RMDLT Portel-Pará REDD Project or Rio Mandaquari REDD+ Project (Project 977), the subject of the action, overlaps areas of the State Agro-extractive Settlement Projects (PEAEX) Deus é Fiel and Joana Peres II - Dorothy Stang. These PEAEX (Extractive Environmental Protection Areas) are public lands, whose real right of use is granted to traditional communities located in the municipality of Portel, in the state of Pará, who did not participate in the challenged project. Project 977 generates REDD+ assets (credits generated by avoided deforestation, sustainable management, and increased forest carbon stocks), was certified by an international company, and has been established since 2009 to obtain carbon credits for forty years. The companies and individual are named in the lawsuit as they are responsible for, and developers of, the project and/or alleged owners of rural properties where it is located. The DPE-PA (Public Defender's Office of Pará) alleges irregularities in the property registrations that comprise the undertaking, and that the project does not have authorization from the state of Pará, which constitutes land grabbing of public lands. Furthermore, the mayor of Portel issued a Public Utility Decree authorizing its operation, which the DPE-PA argues is unconstitutional. It should be noted that the undertaking was implemented without prior study. The Public Defender's Office of Pará (DPE-PA) argues that the defendants acted in violation of the right to traditional territory, the right to prior, free and informed consultation of traditional communities, failed to comply with federal legislation on climate change, payments for environmental services and the concession of public forests, and did not benefit the communities directly affected by the project. It argues that the defendants' conduct gives rise to a duty to repair collective moral damages. In the context of provisional relief, it requests (i) recognition of the possession of the affected traditional communities over their overlapping areas; (ii) the suspension of Project 997 and an injunction preventing the defendants from entering the PEAEX (Extractive Environmental Protection Areas). On the merits, the plaintiff requests (i) confirmation of the urgent requests; (ii) recognition of the right to traditional territory; (iii) invalidation of Project 977 and legal transactions derived from it; (iv) an injunction prohibiting the defendants from entering the territories. (v) the declaration of nullity of the Public Utility Decree issued by the Municipality of Portel; (vi) the condemnation to pay collective moral damages in the amount of R$ 5,000,000.00 to be allocated to the Eastern Amazon Fund in favor of the communities of the agro-extractive territories of Portel.

The court granted the request to include the Pará Land Institute (ITERPA) as a plaintiff in the lawsuit.

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Main norms mobilized

• Article 170 of the Federal Constitution (CRFB/88)
• Article 225 of the Federal Constitution (CRFB/88)
• Forest Code (Federal Law 12.651/2012)
• ILO Convention 169 (Federal Decrees 5.051/2004 and 10.088/2019)
• United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change - UNFCC (Federal Decree 2.652/1998)

Case timeline

Case documents