2025

By Ana Mano and Manuela Andreoni

SAO PAULO, Dec 29 (Reuters) – Some of the world’s largest soybean traders are preparing to break their agreement to curb deforestation of the Amazon rainforest to preserve tax benefits in Brazil’s top farm state, two people with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

The firms exiting the so-called Amazon Soy Moratorium, which has saved millions of acres of tropical forest over nearly two decades, are looking to shield themselves from a new state law in Mato Grosso, the sources said on condition of anonymity.

Starting in January, the state will strip tax incentives from companies taking part in the conservation program. Mato Grosso grew some 51 million metric tons of soybeans in 2025, more than Argentina.

A preliminary report from state auditors in April found that grains traders had benefited from tax incentives worth about 4.7 billion reais ($840 million) between 2019 and 2024.

ADM and Bunge were the top beneficiaries of tax incentives, receiving about 1.5 billion reais ($269 million) each, said Sergio Ricardo, head of the Mato Grosso state audit court.

U.S.-based ADM, Bunge and Cargill, as well as China’s Cofco and Brazil’s Amaggi, are signatories of the pact with facilities in Mato Grosso that have benefited from state tax incentives. It was not clear which of the firms would break immediately from the moratorium.

Cargill referred questions to industry group Abiove, which did not respond to requests for comment. ADM, Bunge, Cofco, Amaggi and grain exporter group Anec did not respond to questions.

“Most companies will choose not to lose the tax incentives and will withdraw from the agreement,” said one of the sources, adding that the departures would effectively end a pact signed in 2006 with the federal government and conservation groups. 

The moratorium is considered one of the most important forces slowing deforestation rates in the Brazilian Amazon over the past two decades as it bars signatories from buying soybeans from farmers who plant on land deforested after July 2008.

Researchers estimate that an area of the rainforest the size of Ireland would have been lost to soy farms in Brazil without the moratorium and related conservation efforts, compared to the pace of expansion in neighboring countries such as Bolivia.

The Mato Grosso law, which lawmakers passed in 2023, is the latest example of a global retreat from pacts and policies to curb climate change, even as temperatures break records, driven by rising fossil fuel use and deforestation. 

Critics of the soy moratorium say that the pact restricts the market and hurts farmers. Farming groups in Mato Grosso say the protocol reduces the income and economic development of the state.

“Companies could choose to keep their zero-deforestation commitments,” said Cristiane Mazzetti, who oversees the moratorium for Greenpeace. “It’s a dangerous precedent, and it’s not what we need in a moment of climate emergency,” she added.

Brazil’s federal government has argued in court against the new Mato Grosso law stripping tax breaks from traders due to their environmental commitments.

“If the Mato Grosso government really removes those incentives, we have heard that some, or many, companies will in fact abandon the moratorium for economic reasons,” said Andre Lima, a senior Environment Ministry official tasked with combating deforestation. He added that firms had not officially informed the ministry of their plans.

FAR-REACHING CONSEQUENCES

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has vowed an “ecological transformation” of the Brazilian economy, capped off with the United Nations climate summit hosted in the Amazon last month.

But in domestic politics, his leftist government is often fighting a rearguard battle to protect the world’s largest rainforest from a farm lobby with the upper hand in Congress.

The unraveling of the Amazon Soy Moratorium is likely to embolden those rural powerbrokers and their allies. This year the farm lobby has successfully gutted environmental permitting laws and stripped some protections from Indigenous lands.

The trend has caught the attention of farmer groups in Europe arguing to block a free trade agreement between the European Union and South America’s Mercosur due to the impact of Brazilian agribusiness on vital ecosystems.

Brazil’s Supreme Court has barred some but not all of the farm lobby’s agenda in Congress, based on constitutional protections for the environment and Indigenous peoples. 

Environmentalists warn that the end of the soy moratorium could pave the way to dismantle other environmental protections in the world’s largest soybean producer, including part of Brazil’s forestry code restricting farmers from felling trees on 80% of their properties in the Amazon.

In recent years, soybean farmers pushed state lawmakers in Mato Grosso, Rondonia and Maranhao to strip tax benefits from companies taking part in environmental pacts more restrictive than Brazilian law.

It remains unclear which environmental commitments outside the soy moratorium will trigger those new state laws, which could threaten a range of other companies, including cellulose producers and meatpackers.

Brazilian antitrust agency CADE has separately opened an investigation of the soy moratorium for a potential breach of competition rules. For nearly two decades, trading firms have shared the cost of monitoring soy farms in the Amazon to avoid buying from those planting on newly deforested land.

Starting in January, CADE has ordered traders “to refrain from collecting, storing, sharing, or disseminating commercial information related to the sale, production, or acquisition of soybeans.”

Soy farmers in Mato Grosso have also sued grain traders for roughly $180 million over their role in the pact.

In temporary rulings, Supreme Court Justice Flavio Dino stopped the antitrust investigation, but let the Mato Grosso law take effect. Environmental groups are still trying to block the state law ahead of a final court ruling on the issue.

($1 = 5.56 reais)

(Reporting by Ana Mano and Manuela AndreoniEditing by Brad Haynes and Lisa Shumaker)

source

The Trump administration made work requirements for low-income people receiving government assistance a priority in 2025.

The departments of Health and Human Services, Agriculture and Housing and Urban Development have worked to usher in stricter employment conditions to receive health care, food aid and rental assistance benefits funded by the federal government.

The idea is that public assistance discourages optimal participation in the labor market and that imposing work requirements not only leads to self-sufficiency, but also benefits the broader economy.

“It strengthens families and communities as it gives new life to start-ups and growing businesses,” the cabinet secretaries wrote in a New York Times essay in May about work requirements.

Yet many economists say there is no clear evidence such mandates have that effect. There’s concern these new policies that make benefits contingent on work could ultimately come at a cost in other ways, from hindering existing employment to heavy administrative burdens or simply proving unpopular politically.

Here is a look at how work requirements could impact the millions of people who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Medicaid and HUD-subsidized housing:

President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” in July expanded the USDA’s work requirements policy for SNAP recipients who are able-bodied adults without dependents.

Previously, adults older than 54, as well as parents with children under age 18, at home were exempted from SNAP’s 80-hours monthly work requirement. Now, adults up to age 64 and parents of children between the age of 14 and 17 have to prove they’re working, volunteering or job training if they are on SNAP for more than three months.

The new law also cuts exemptions for people who are homeless, veterans and young people who have aged out of foster care. There are also significant restrictions on waivers for states and regions based on how high the local unemployment rates are.

The Pew Research Center, citing the most recent Census survey data from 2023, notes 61% of adult SNAP recipients had not been employed that year, and that the national average benefit as of May 2025 was $188.45 per person or $350.89 per household.

Ismael Cid Martinez, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, said the people who qualify for SNAP are likely working low-wage jobs that tend to be less stable because they are more tied to the nation’s macroeconomics. That means when the economy weakens, it’s the low-wage workers whose hours are cut and jobs are eliminated, which in turn heightens their need for government support. Restricting such benefits could threaten their ability to get back to work altogether, Martinez said.

“These are some of the matters that tie in together to explain the economy and (how) the labor market is connected to these benefits,” Martinez said. “None of us really show up into an economy on our own.”

Angela Rachidi, a researcher at the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute, said she expects the poverty rate to decline as a result of the work requirements but even that wouldn’t ultimately affect the labor force.

“(E)ven if every nonworking SNAP adult subject to a work requirement started working, it would not impact the labor market much,” Rachidi said by email.

Trump’s big bill over the summer also created new requirements, starting in 2027, for low-income 19- to 64-year-olds enrolled in Medicaid through the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion or through a waiver program to complete 80 hours of work, job training, education or volunteering per month. There are several exemptions, including for those who are caregivers, have disabilities, have recently left prison or jail or are pregnant or postpartum.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has predicted that millions of people will lose health care because of the requirements.

Nationally, most people on Medicaid already work. The majority of experts on a Cornell Health Policy Center panel said that new national requirements won’t lead to large increases in employment rates among working adults on Medicaid, and that many working people would lose health care because of administrative difficulties proving they work.

Georgia is currently the only state with a Medicaid program that imposes work requirements, which Gov. Brian Kemp created instead of expanding Medicaid. The program, called Georgia Pathways, has come under fire for enrolling far fewer people than expected and creating large administrative costs.

Critics say many working people struggle to enroll and log their hours online, with some getting kicked out of coverage at times because of administrative errors.

And research released recently from the United Kingdom-based research group BMJ comparing Georgia with other states that did not expand Medicaid found Georgia Pathways did not increase employment during the first 15 months, nor did it improve access to Medicaid.

Kemp’s office blames high administrative costs and startup challenges on delays due to legal battles with former President Joe Biden’s administration. A spokesperson said 19,383 Georgians have received coverage since the program began.

HUD in July also proposed a rule change that would allow public housing authorities across the country to institute work requirements, as well as time limits.

In a leaked draft of that rule change, HUD spells out how housing authorities can choose to opt in and voluntarily implement work requirements of up to 40 hours a week for people getting rental assistance, including adult tenants in public housing and Section 8 voucher-holders.

HUD also identified two states — Arkansas and Wisconsin — where it could trigger implementation based on existing state laws if and when the HUD rule change is approved. The proposal remains in regulatory review and would be subject to a public comment period.

HUD spokesman Matthew Maley declined to comment on the leaked documents, which broadly define the age of work-eligible people being up to age 61, with exemptions for people with disabilities and those who are in school or are pregnant. Primary caregivers of disabled people and children under 6 years old are also exempted.

HUD’s proposed rule change also notes that it is only defining the upper limits of the policy, allowing flexibility for local agencies to further define their individual programs with additional exemptions.

In a review of how housing authorities have tested work requirements over time, researchers at New York University found few successful examples, noting only one case where there were modest increases in employment — in Charlotte, North Carolina — as compared to seven other regions where work requirements were changed or discontinued “because they were deemed punitive or hard to administer.”

source