Chapter 10
Brazilian Legal Framework Applicable
to the Blue Amazon’s Seabed: An
Assessment of Consistency
with International Law
While the previous chapter depicted the domestic policy and institutional panorama
framing the management of Brazilian maritime spaces, the so-called “Blue Amazon”, this part sets out to map the national marine environmental laws and regulations on the continental shelf and to assess their consistency with international law,
in particular UNCLOS. As Brazil “enlarges” its Blue Amazon, through the delineation of outer continental shelf limits, it is the case to answer two core questions: (i) Is
the Brazilian legal framework in accordance with general international law and the
law of the sea, namely UNCLOS? (ii) Are there any legal-environmental implications arising from the process of delineating outer continental shelf limits for the
Brazilian state?
Concerns with the exploitation model of Brazilian marine resources are not new.
Already in 1989, the LEPLAC Decree urged the need to both “integrate” the outer
continental shelf to the Brazilian marine space and achieve the “rational exploitation
of the ocean”.
1 Such dual justification for the Decree—enlarging maritime spaces
and riches under national jurisdiction plus regulating the exploitation of the area, so
that it be rational—is praiseworthy. Yet, the phrase “rational exploitation” alone, if
unaccompanied by any other qualifier, can be subject to dual interpretations, especially so at the time of the Decree’s approval. It may suggest, for instance, the most
efficient exploitation from an economic perspective, thereby neglecting ecological
concerns in its reasoning. Following the LEPLAC Decree, Brazil hosted the 1992
World Conference on Environment and Development, in which marine concerns
came decisively to the fore, as in Principle 17 of Agenda 21, on the protection of the
oceans and all kinds of seas.
2 Since then, the country had been actively negotiating
1 Decree no. 98.145/1989, item II.
2 Principle 17 of Agenda 21 suggested the adoption of the following program areas by states:
(a) Integrated management and sustainable development of coastal areas, including exclusive
economic zones; (b) Marine environmental protection; (c) Sustainable use and conservation of
marine living resources of the high seas; (d) Sustainable use and conservation of marine living
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to
Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
V. Alencar Mayer Feitosa Ventura, Environmental Jurisdiction in the Law of the Sea,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50543-1_10
297
Brazilian Legal Framework Applicable
to the Blue Amazon’s Seabed: An
Assessment of Consistency
with International Law
While the previous chapter depicted the domestic policy and institutional panorama
framing the management of Brazilian maritime spaces, the so-called “Blue Amazon”, this part sets out to map the national marine environmental laws and regulations on the continental shelf and to assess their consistency with international law,
in particular UNCLOS. As Brazil “enlarges” its Blue Amazon, through the delineation of outer continental shelf limits, it is the case to answer two core questions: (i) Is
the Brazilian legal framework in accordance with general international law and the
law of the sea, namely UNCLOS? (ii) Are there any legal-environmental implications arising from the process of delineating outer continental shelf limits for the
Brazilian state?
Concerns with the exploitation model of Brazilian marine resources are not new.
Already in 1989, the LEPLAC Decree urged the need to both “integrate” the outer
continental shelf to the Brazilian marine space and achieve the “rational exploitation
of the ocean”.
1 Such dual justification for the Decree—enlarging maritime spaces
and riches under national jurisdiction plus regulating the exploitation of the area, so
that it be rational—is praiseworthy. Yet, the phrase “rational exploitation” alone, if
unaccompanied by any other qualifier, can be subject to dual interpretations, especially so at the time of the Decree’s approval. It may suggest, for instance, the most
efficient exploitation from an economic perspective, thereby neglecting ecological
concerns in its reasoning. Following the LEPLAC Decree, Brazil hosted the 1992
World Conference on Environment and Development, in which marine concerns
came decisively to the fore, as in Principle 17 of Agenda 21, on the protection of the
oceans and all kinds of seas.
2 Since then, the country had been actively negotiating
1 Decree no. 98.145/1989, item II.
2 Principle 17 of Agenda 21 suggested the adoption of the following program areas by states:
(a) Integrated management and sustainable development of coastal areas, including exclusive
economic zones; (b) Marine environmental protection; (c) Sustainable use and conservation of
marine living resources of the high seas; (d) Sustainable use and conservation of marine living
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to
Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
V. Alencar Mayer Feitosa Ventura, Environmental Jurisdiction in the Law of the Sea,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50543-1_10
297