Paula Laboissière and Luana Lourenço       Special Correspondents for EBC

Porto Alegre – The World Social Forum (called, in Portuguese, this year, the “Forum Social Themática”) ended on an upbeat note yesterday, Sunday, January 29; after all, the overarching theme of the forum remains: “A Better World Is Possible.” The tone in Davos was gloomy. Although neither the president nor any high-ranking members of the economic team attended, Brazil was one of the themes there. In fact, the closing party on Saturday was a Brazilian party with samba and cachaça – served up in front of a large-screen TV showing memorable moments of play by past and present Brazilian soccer greats in World Soccer Cup games. Brazil invested no less than R$5 million on Davos, sponsoring seminars and buying space on outdoors, besides the farewell party).

Meanwhile, in Porto Alegre, environmental activists demanded a stronger position by the Dilma Rousseff administration on the so-called “green economy concept” that is to be the central theme of the Rio + 20 conference. Activists fear the whole thing is just the rich nations putting a wolf in sheep’s clothing (again) because any “new” economic model those guys present will never be more than a repetition of the same old development patterns that are exhausting the planet’s natural resources.

However, the idea of transforming the Porto Alegre meeting into a dialogue was frustrated as it turned into a succession of speeches of approximately 20 minutes each.

The Bolivian environmentalist, Pablo Salon leveled harsh criticism at the Rio + 20 green economy concept saying it was an attempt to hoodwink people. He called for a grand mobilization against it. “The same way we defeated the idea of the Americas free trade area (known as FTAA) we will knock down this attempt to privatize and transform the use of natural resources into a mercantile system,” he declared.

Carmen Foro, a Brazilian union leader, began praising the Dilma administration, but said it had to do more about meeting worker demands, such as the 40 hour work week, punishing slave-type labor and advancing further in the area of land reform. She also other activists in attacking the green economy concept saying what was needed was a new standard of development.

In her participation, president Dilma Rousseff said she believed “It is possible to grow, include, protect and conserve.” She added that the goals of the forum in Porto Alegre and the Rio + 20 conference had to be focused on combating poverty and inequality.

Allen Bennett – translator/editor The News in English – content modified

Link - Dilma defende que Rio+20 tenha metas de desenvolvimento sustentável centradas no combate à pobreza

Link - Em encontro com Dilma no Fórum Social Temático, movimentos sociais criticam economia verde