By Waldaniel Amadis | 2025-04-22

SÃO PAULO -- The recent visit of a delegation of Chinese engineers to Brazil has reignited concerns over the potential environmental impact of the proposed Brazil-Peru Bioceanic Corridor -- a Chinese-backed railway project pitched as an alternative to the Panama Canal for South American exports.

Over seven days, 11 representatives of the China Railway Group Limited (CREC) and the Chinese Ministry of Transport toured key infrastructure sites in Brazil.

On April 16, the delegation arrived in Ilhéus to evaluate the progress of the East-West Integration Railway Line (FIOL), a strategic segment that could serve as the launch point for the Bioceanic

Several companies, including CREC, are building it.

The Bioceanic Corridor seeks to link the Atlantic and Pacific oceans through a transcontinental railroad that cuts across the Amazon and ends at Port Chancay, Peru, operated by China's state-owned Cosco Shipping Ports.

Designed to streamline the export of Brazilian commodities such as soybeans, meat and grains to China, the project would bypass traditional Atlantic shipping routes.

As part of China's Belt and Road Initiative, it promises to reduce maritime distances between South America and Asia by as much as 20,000 nautical miles.

Resistance

The proposal has sparked resistance due to its potential impact on Indigenous territories and areas of high biodiversity within the so-called lungs of the planet, according to Amazonian news outlet Contilnet.

It would affect at least 11 Brazilian states, most notably Acre, which borders Bolivia and Peru and is seen as strategically important to reducing transportation costs for the railroad.

The proposed route cuts through the Sierra del Moa region, home to numerous Indigenous communities, including uncontacted peoples, and would traverse protected environmental reserves in one of the world's most biodiverse ecosystems.

The plan is under review by Brazil's Federal Public Prosecutor's Office, a source from the agency confirmed to Entorno.

A source from the Acre government confirmed to Entorno that the Chinese delegation formalized the proposal at its April 16 meeting in Rio Branco with local authorities in Bahia state and the Brazilian Ministry of Transport.

Decade of controversy

Conceived in the 1950s, the project was shelved until 2008, when Brazil included it in its National Highway Plan.

In 2014, China expressed interest in advancing the project and offered financing, estimated at about $100 billion.

After years of back and forth, Brasilia put the project on hold in 2015 because of growing concerns from environmentalists and other specialists about its potential impact in the heart of the Amazon.

A report from the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America (SALSA) at the time expressed "deep concern" over the environmental and social consequences of the project.

According to SALSA, the proposed project, which would traverse untouched primary rainforest, posed a significant threat, particularly to isolated Indigenous peoples and traditional communities living in the area.

"The project jeopardizes one of the world's largest continuous expanses of tropical forest, home to Indigenous groups with little or no contact with the outside world. Many of these communities have chosen isolation as a survival strategy after traumatic encounters with external forces," the 2015 study warned, now resurfacing with the arrival of the Chinese delegation.

SALSA cautioned that beyond the railroad itself, the construction would require access roads, stations and additional infrastructure, which could increase pressure on already demarcated Indigenous territories.

Ecosystem destruction

This project would raise the risks of illegal land seizures, logging and drug trafficking.

Communities such as the Shipibo-Conibo, Asheninka, Puyanawa, Yaminawa, Xavante and Nambikara, among others, could be directly impacted.

Furthermore, the project would affect the Brazilian Cerrado, an ecosystem with extraordinary biodiversity that is already facing deforestation driven by the expansion of soybean production, much of it exported to China for animal feed.

Indigenous groups and international nongovernmental organizations, such as Survival, have raised alarms about the destruction the project could cause.

Initially planned to run between Rio de Janeiro and Ilo, Peru, the route is now set to extend from Porto Sul, Ilhéus, Bahia state, Brazil, to Port Chancay, Peru, about 80km from Lima.