How a Report for the World newsroom is tracking desertification in Brazil

In 1999 Inácio França, then a reporter in Recife, traveled through the Northeast of Brazil documenting the advance of desertification in the region. The series of stories he wrote served as a curtain raiser for the United Nations’ Conference of the Parties (COP,) a forum where experts discussed the dangers of desertification and called upon governments to take action. The conference was held in Recife because the region registered alarming signs of land degradation.

Twenty five years later França, now an editor for Report for the World’s partner newsroom Marco Zero, worked with our corps members Giovanna Carneiro and Arnaldo Sete, with the support of Journalismfund Europe, to follow his footsteps and look into the measures taken after the COP conference to see if desertification had slowed down or reversed in the region. It didn’t take them long to notice that the desert’s advance had continued unabated.