Who profits from climate lies? The disinformation economy and Brazil’s path toward COP30

The Amazon rainforest, the BBC, and the new highway of disinformation

In previous editions:

#1 The COP President’s worst nightmare is real
#2 “Shopee Indigenous Peoples” and climate disinformation

A lot of new people joined us over these past few months.
So glad to have you here with us!

We can’t design solutions for what we can’t see. That’s exactly how the climate disinformation machine works, a system I (Thais here!) have been calling the supply chain of climate lies. It’s a powerful, strategic, and highly profitable disinformation ecosystem targeting both the climate and people. The kicker? It doesn’t yet exist as a mapped, concrete system anywhere. But we’re working to change that.

Want to talk to us about it? Just send a quick "Hi" in the DMs!

According to the ILO, a production chain is "a set of interconnected activities that transform raw materials into final products or services—from extraction to distribution and consumption." Now imagine this logic applied to lies.

Climate disinformation has become a commodity, shaping global decisions, as we’ve already discussed here at the Climate & Environmental Information Integrity Observatory.

We urgently need to shine a collective light on this emerging market-system, where you and I are the end consumers, and start talking solutions. Information is a right.

So, who’s involved in this billion-dollar disinformation chain?

• Privately owned companies

• Digital channels that transport disinformation — platforms, apps

• Actors, channels, and messaging groups — politicians (and caucuses), religious leaders, influencers, businesspeople… yes, a full ecosystem

• Companies, groups, and movements with vested interests

• The media and advertising industry

The International Panel on the Information Environment (IPIE) has just released a review of 300 studies published between 2015 and 2025, confirming what we’ve long been saying here: “The findings show that powerful actors — including corporations, governments, and political parties — intentionally spread inaccurate or misleading narratives about climate change.”

Beyond the profits that fuel this ecosystem, there’s also a cross-sectoral impact of these lies on geopolitics, governments, public policy, science, journalism, the lives of individuals and organizations (many of whom are targeted and threatened), and on businesses.

You’re about to see a real case of a lie going viral online.
Stay with us, don’t lose the thread.

If we agree that disinformation impacts a country’s sovereignty, the global climate agenda (from urban planning to energy transition), and the rights of communities and individuals, then we urgently need to move toward a new kind of discussion:
shifting from individual accountability to systemic accountability.

We have a key moment on the agenda: Brazil, after launching a global initiative on climate information integrity at the G20 and last year’s COP, in partnership with UNESCO and the UN, now has the opportunity to lead a bold, global movement toward COP30.

During the Global Summit we hosted with partners in Brasília (Brazil) this March (pictured below), with over 150 participants, the Brazilian government officially committed to including climate information integrity in the COP agenda.

Photo: Alex Amaral / FALA – Impact Studio

This week, a major step was taken:
For the first time in history, climate information integrity has officially entered the COP Action Agenda.

📸 Photo: Isabela Castilho | COP30 Brazil

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💡 CASE STUDY
There was a highway in the middle of it all - and the BBC.

The chart below shows March data from our monthly COP30 monitoring of Brazilian online spaces, conducted by FALA and CAAD's research unit using Brandwatch data. The spike in Brazil’s online traffic was caused by the sharing of a report from the UK’s BBC about a road being built in Pará, connecting the two largest cities in the state: the capital, Belém, and Ananindeua.

In total, we identified 20,000 mentions of COP30 alongside the terms “highway” or “road.”

The “Avenida Liberdade” cuts through a conservation unit. The BBC’s headline is damning: “Amazon forest felled to build road for climate summit.”

Let’s be clear: the problem isn’t exactly the BBC (in fact, we have readers from there…Hi BBC folks, hope you’re doing well!), the issue lies in the cunning, sneaky supply chain of lies. The press is always a primary target of disinformers, and using facts to deceive is a technique straight out of their playbook (we’ll explain more below).

“Here in Brazil, you haven’t heard a thing,” said a YouTuber in a conspiratorial tone in one of the most-watched videos about the BBC report. “But abroad, everyone is talking about this outrage!”

WHO - ANCAPSU, a channel by Ricardo Albuquerque Pinto, a profile mentioned several times by UFRJ’s NetLab in the report “How YouTube Funds Climate Denial, Conspiracism, and Disinformation About Rio Grande do Sul.”

FOLLOWERS
YouTube: 708K
X/Twitter (150 mil)

PUBLICATION DATE
March 13, 2025

VIEWS
98K

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Shall we take a closer look at what actually happened?
First of all, the focus is on a 13 km (8 miles) stretch of road that has been in planning stages since 2012 (as the BBC itself reports). Just for comparison, the Rio-Niterói bridge in Rio de Janeiro is longer than that.

It’s not an insignificant amount of deforestation, but it’s tiny compared to another piece of information that wasn’t mentioned and didn’t even register a blip on the chart at the top of this newsletter. According to Imazon, the state of Pará has held the national deforestation record every year since 2016. In 2024 alone, (brace yourself) 1,260 km² (486.5 square miles) of Amazon rainforest was destroyed there. Remember our comparison with the Rio-Niterói bridge? Well, this area is the equivalent of… the entire city of Rio de Janeiro. Yes, seriously.

You’re getting the picture, right?

Those who oppose the UN Climate Conference are never going to mention the 486.5 square miles, because this deforestation has mostly been driven by agribusiness (over 90%, according to MapBiomas), to clear land for pasture. Some sectors of agribusiness actively fund the climate disinformation machine (according to Agência Pública), and that’s no coincidence: the SEEG (Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Removals Estimating System) reports that agribusiness is “responsible for 74% of all Brazilian climate pollution.”

Turning the BBC report into a weapon against COP30 is a textbook disinformation tactic, and it’s got two hideous names, both of which are in the Climate Disinformation Reference Guide, produced by CAAD.

• Cherry picking
  Also known as “selective bias,” this tactic involves “carefully selecting only the data that supports a position, while ignoring evidence that contradicts it.”

• Paltering
  According to a definition from Harvard that we cited in the guide (fancy, right?), this is “the active use of truthful statements to influence a target’s beliefs by giving a false or distorted impression.”

“Let’s focus on the 8-mile road, and just quietly forget about the area the size of Rio de Janeiro that’s been deforested. No one will even notice, right?”

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🫢 Oii!? (What, in English)

Lawmakers are using public funds to sponsor pro-mining ads on social media, some showing clear signs of greenwashing. Reported by Erika Zordan for InfoAmazonia.

The so-called “Agro COP” was canceled, as reported by Fábio Zanini in Folha de S.Paulo. But what kind of agribusiness does this agro represent?

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🤩 That friendly Oii (or Hello, in English)

GRANT
For those looking to join forces for climate information integrity: UNESCO has just launched a new call for project proposals. Applications are open until July 6, 2025.

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Oii shines a light on the suply chain of lies because we can’t create solutions for what we can’t see.