Photo: Donaldo Hadlich/Código 19/Folhapress
Hundreds of cities in southern Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state are underwater, suffering the effects of historic floods caused by all-time high river levels.
As of Tuesday afternoon, local authorities had confirmed a death toll of 90 people, with another 132 missing. More than 200,000 have been forced to leave their homes, and these numbers are certain to continue rising over the coming days.
Experts are already comparing the path of destruction and its effects on the local health system to the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe in 2005 in New Orleans.
Beyond the human toll, the disaster has had massive effects on the local economy, affecting agriculture, logistics, commerce, infrastructure, and everything in between.
In today’s episode, we’ll discuss the extent of the crisis, how this catastrophe came to pass, and what could have been done to prevent it.
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Hundreds of cities in southern Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state are underwater, suffering the effects of historic floods caused by all-time high river levels. As of Tuesday afternoon, local authorities had confirmed a death toll of 90 people, with another 132 missing. More than 200,000 people have been forced to leave their homes, and these numbers are certain to continue rising over the coming days. Experts are already comparing the path of destruction and its effects on the local health
system to the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe in 2005 in New Orleans. And beyond the human toll, the disaster has had massive effects on the local economy, affecting agriculture, logistics, commerce, infrastructure, and everything in between. In today’s episode, we will discuss the extent of the crisis, how this climate catastrophe came to pass, and what could have been done to prevent it.
My name is Gustavo Ribeiro, editor-in-chief of The Brazilian Report, and this is Explaining Brazil, you should subscribe to our website, which is the journalistic engine behind this podcast. You can also go the extra mile and make a donation to our newsroom, buying a cup of coffee to one of our journalists. And God knows, reporters live off of coffee. Our biggest enthusiast has been a reader called Carson Allen
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Thanks for supporting us. This week I’m joined by Ewan Marshall, Deputy Editor of the Brazilian Report.
Ewan, thanks for being on the show. Hi, Gustavo. So, Ewan, news is coming thick and fast from Rio Grande do Sul as more destruction takes place and the death toll rises further. But if we could just start by zooming out a little bit, can you give us a timeline for this tragedy, if you will?
Yeah, sure. So, Rio Grande do Sul is Brazil’s southernmost state. It’s way down there on the border with Uruguay and Argentina. It’s an area just maybe roughly the size of Poland, so this is quite a big area that we’re talking about here. And this current tragedy, we can date this back to April 27th, which is a week and a half ago at the time
that we’re recording. And so that’s when storms started to hit the state and they just, they didn’t really let up for days on end. Rivers began bursting their banks and that led to widespread flooding, which only got worse, worse, and worse.
And the death toll began increasing and then the number of displaced people got out of control and at this point state authorities are saying that some 1.3 million people have been affected by the floods. And the way that this catastrophe has progressed is largely down to the geography of Rio Grande do Sul and exactly where these major rainstorms fell because rivers, there’s lots of rivers in Rio Grande do Sul and they link the state cities up from the higher altitudes regions, you know, Brazil’s wine country, down to the state capital Porto
Alegre, where the metropolitan area of Porto Alegre is home to about four and a half million people. So what we’ve seen is a kind of like a delayed destruction. The overflowing rivers in these higher altitudes spread down to the highly populated coast, leaving Porto Alegre and these other surrounding cities underwater.
And as I mentioned before, the current death toll by the time we were recording this stands at 90 people. Which areas have been hit the hardest?
Well I think this is another important aspect of this catastrophe because usually when we see these storms, these extreme climate events, they affect relatively concentrated areas on the map. Here, the 90 deaths that have been recorded so far have been spread over more than 40 different cities, and that is affecting almost all of the macro regions of the Gnoisdau sole state. So unsurprisingly, because it is so spread out, that has really affected rescue efforts, because there are so many critical points across the state and there’s limited personnel. If we had to single out somewhere
as being the epicenter of the disaster, you’d look to the valley of Taquari which is in the center of the state. And there we saw lots of small rivers overflowing and feeding massive amounts of water into the Taquari River which burst its banks and left large areas underwater because lots of the towns in that region are actually built in the flood plains and there’s not sufficient protection there against you know when river levels get that high. But then again you also have the capital, Porto
Alegre, and many of the state’s major rivers flow towards that city. The Guaíba Lake which runs beside the city is at an all-time high level and is unlikely anytime soon.
So Eoghan, what has caused all this destruction? Because like most extreme weather disasters, flooding involves a number of competing factors that may affect frequency and intensity. How this tragedy came to be and how has it gotten so bad?
Well, I mean basically the weather experts at the moment are describing what Rio Grande do Sul is going through as meteorological hell, essentially. Of course, we’re not weather experts but to try to explain this in the simplest terms as possible, we have a cold front coming from Argentina in the south and that is meeting warm air coming from the Amazon in the kind of to the north, maybe the kind of northwest direction, and that causes heavy rains. But instead of these heavy rains dissipating after a while, the storm
clouds have essentially been trapped in Rio Grande do Sul because there’s an area of high pressure to the north of the state, which basically stops the rain from leaving the state.
Yes, so it’s like this area of high pressure in Brazil’s southeast and center-west has created a sort of barrier, meaning that humidity basically can pass through it. I mean, that’s also why us in Sao Paulo have not been seeing a drop of rain for weeks. Temperatures are much higher than they are usually at this time of the year.
I mean, we have had a steady 32 degrees Celsius every day for the past week or so. And I mean, this is the middle of fall.
Yeah, and while this persists, while this heatwave persists in Sao Paulo and other parts of the Southeast, it’s just going to keep raining in Rio Grande do Sul. So that’s meaning that this state has just seen more and more showers and the river is just getting higher and higher.
Right, so you’re mentioning the weather factors that have contributed to this tragedy, but that’s not the whole story, is it?
Yeah, I mean, it’s not really just this unlucky combination of weather factors because we’ve seen extreme climate events becoming much more common in Brazil. In 2023, the country recorded a total of 1,161 natural disasters. Much of that was put down to the intensity of the ongoing El Nino weather phenomenon, which involves the heating of waters in the Pacific Ocean and it drastically changed rainfall patterns. And I mean, we’ve seen the south of Brazil, this same place that is being affected now, face deadly rainfall as early as seven months ago, when an extra tropical cyclone hit the
region. So, you know, this idea of more heavy rain here just hasn’t come out of the blue.
And beyond the human toll, which I mean has been massive and it is the worst aspect of this crisis of course, but we also have to mention the economic effects of this crisis which are pretty huge and that impacts private companies, that impacts governments, local and federal. I mean the state capital Porto Alegre is underwater. Rio Grande do Sul is
a major producer of rice and soybeans and crops. It must be feeling serious impacts from this massive torrential rainfall, right?
Yes, so I think if I can just give you a quick rundown of the disruption. There are 450,000 homes without electricity at the moment in the state, 649,000 homes without water, dozens of cities without internet or phone signal, some 790 schools are closed, 41 highways are partially or fully blocked and the airport in Porto Alegre is underwater. Some shocking footage of the city of Porto Alegre, including the city’s airport, just under a reasonable bit of flooding there. So it’s chaos at the moment.
And you can hardly imagine how businesses around the state would be able to open under those conditions. So the local economy is more or less completely on hold at the moment.
Yeah, and we have been seeing many cases of blue thing as well. So that’s another deterrent for commerce to open. Now, agriculture is a big question mark here, right? Because like I mentioned, Yucatan is an important producing state
and had already been suffering from yield losses over the past few years due to droughts. So the polar opposite effect of what we’re seeing now, not only do you have facilities themselves experiencing floods, but those, with those logistical problems that you
mentioned like closed roads, closed airports, how are producers expected to get their products to market and how are they expected to receive crucial inputs and
materials? Well yeah I mean around one-third of the state’s chicken and pork factories to give you an example they’ve had to shut down. Some of these have been owned by big export leaders, you know, BRF and JBS, which some people might know. But so, you know, imagine the situation that they’re in. They can’t receive the animals that they want to slaughter. They can’t send meat to places where they’re going to sell the meat, to consumer centres, and they can’t get any animal feed from grain warehouses, which themselves are completely cut off. Some places have had to ration the food that they give to their
herds. We haven’t yet had reports of major animal deaths or things like that, but it’s around the corner if the situation continues like this for much longer. Some groups are saying that it could take some 30 days for the system to go back to normal.
And soybeans is a major industry in the States. Hibidinjo do Sul is not necessarily a massive producer like Mato Grosso and other states in the soybean belt, but it still grows about 15% of Brazil’s soybean output. And 15% of Brazil’s entire output is a lot because Brazil is the world’s number one soybean producer.
Yeah, and I mean the forecasts aren’t good. One local analyst suggested that 2 million tonnes of soybeans will be lost due to this crisis, although there are some other estimates that are a bit more conservative. It is important to bear in mind that we are not just thinking about soybean crops. There is also the matter of the grains that are being stored in these flooded warehouses. Grains that have a higher moisture level typically sell for less, so it is a real worry for the sector in Rio Grande do Sul. And then, of course, you mentioned earlier there’s rice, which of Rio Grande do Sul
is a major grower of rice. And that’s something that, of course, is present on the table of almost every Brazilian household on a daily basis. And the federal government is already talking about potentially needing to import rice due to the disaster, which is something that’s really not common in Brazil at all.
A few weeks ago, when we discussed this in this podcast, the number of farmers filing for bankruptcy protection had gone up in recent months. So we should be seeing the ripple effects of this crisis over the next few months. You mentioned earlier that Brazil’s south has already faced severe heavy rains and floods in September of last year. Does that mean that the extent of these floods could have been mitigated? I mean, were there any alarm bells being sounded by experts, by meteorologists?
Well, I think when you get something of this magnitude, and you know, as we described earlier, these three different factors of weather coming together to cause something this severe, I don’t think you can necessarily predict that. But Brazil as a whole could be doing a lot more to safeguard its cities from the effects of extreme climate events, especially considering, as we’ve discussed, that they’re becoming more and more common. But Brazil has been basically ignoring the warning signs. For instance, the 1.2 billion reais that the federal government budgeted for disaster prevention policies last year, that was the lowest in 14 years. For this year, Rio Grande do Sul
state cut its budget for disaster mitigation services by 7.5% and none of the federal lawmakers from Rio Grande do Sul used any of their parliamentary earmarks to pay for any environmental conservation services or disaster prevention or anything like that. And also the city of Porto Alegre, which we’ve seen is underwater at the moment, the state capital didn’t even spend a single penny on flood prevention last year.
No, and what you’re saying reminds me of something we have written about on the Brazilian report’s website, which is about the future of climate in Brazil. And actually, that study warned that the country may face dramatic climate conditions by 2040, which is just around the corner. They cite that violent droughts may
prevent hydroelectric plants from generating enough power, which could have massive impacts on inflation, on Brazil’s productivity. Crops could see a reduction of up to 39% in their area. And rising sea levels would expose real estate worth up to 124 billion reais to a high risk of destruction.
And that is just in the city of Rio de Janeiro, not to mention that more elderly people would die from heat waves, especially in the north and northeast regions, which are the warmest in Brazil. I mean, a lot of that we are already experiencing. And still, the study was published without much fanfare and has been largely ignored since. And we have had multiple since that study came to be. And I mean, now that the catastrophe is all over the news and being widely discussed,
then there seems to be no shortage of resources being thrown at the issue. But, I mean, we have been seeing in Brasília a lot of discussion as to how we’re going to earmark this money. Governor Eduardo Leite of Rio Grande do Sul asked for a Marshall Plan-like aid package. I mean, what are we talking about here in terms of figures? And is that a long-term concern? Because we have, the past few weeks, discussed whether or not the government would be able to meet
its fiscal targets. So now we’re having that crisis adding more pressure to the finance industry.
Yeah, I think that the federal government will be careful to make sure that it is seen to be providing as much resources as it can to this particular crisis, while not leaving itself in proper trouble for the future. But we did see some discussion among analysts saying that it might be Congress that we need to watch out for. The standard practice in a situation like this would be Congress opening up these kind of one-off spending mechanisms, like an emergency credit, these sorts of things that they can pass quite easily in Congress, and it’s a one-off thing. But there is a concern
that Congress could take advantage of the situation and maybe bring in some like constitutional amendments and that means that you know it just erodes budget controls for the future makes it quite complicated for the government going
forward. Yeah and I mean the new fiscal framework the the INCADET is not even dry at this moment, it was passed just last year. So Ewan, with all this tragedy and chaos what’s next for Hibernation Zoo? What are we expecting for the coming days and weeks? We have seen many government officials travel into the affected areas. So what could we expect now?
Well, again, as we mentioned earlier on in the programme, I think the geography of Porto Alegre, the state capital, and the way that the Guaíba Lake flows into the Atlantic Ocean, it’s going to take some time for things to normalise. There are some local authorities saying that the river levels in the state capital are going to take around 10 days to drop to below emergency levels. So I mean, the actual extent of this crisis is going to be much longer than just maybe a week or a couple of weeks. And also there’s even more rain forecast for the rest of this week and officials are worried about
another cold front that will be coming in from the south and the fear there is that you know there’s so many people who have been displaced so there comes you know a lot of risks of hypothermia and things like that when there’s a lot more people on the streets potentially.
And donations have been rolling in from all over the world. If our listeners want your help, what should they do?
Well, for people in Brazil, the Rio Grande do Sul state government has set up a crowdfunding channel where people can donate however much they like via PIX, the country’s instant payment system. But of course, for those who are outside of Brazil, who don’t have access to PIX, there are a couple of different options of NGOs and social movements who can accept donations in Euros, Dollars and Pounds. And also the state government of Rio Grande do Sul has done something similar. They’ve set up channels which people can donate money in foreign currencies.
And we’ll make sure that we link to all of that information in the show notes for anyone who wants to donate.
is already behind us and our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Rio Grande do Sul. And if you like Explaining Brazil, please give us a five-star rating wherever you get your podcasts. Or better yet, you should subscribe to the Brazilian report, the journalistic engine behind this podcast. We have a subscription-based business model and your memberships fuel our journalism and keep us going and growing. And our work has been recognized for its quality.
We have won and been shortlisted for several international awards. And most recently, the Brazilian report was named the best news website in the Americas for a small or local newsroom by the World Association of News Publishers, one if them. To continue doing this work, we need your support. Go to www.brazilian.report. To continue doing this work, we need your support. Go to www.brazilian.report. I’m Gustavo Ribeiro. Thanks for listening. Explaining Brazil will be back next week
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