Brazil Ramps Up Wildfire Preparedness for El Niño
Brazil has significantly increased its wildfire spending and hired a record number of federal firefighters in anticipation of extreme drought in the Amazon, driven by what could be one of the strongest El Niño events in over a century.
The El Niño climate pattern, which emerges from unusually warm waters in the tropical Pacific, typically brings hotter, drier conditions to large parts of the Amazon, raising the risk of severe drought and large wildfires. With a ‘strong’ to ‘very strong’ El Niño forecast for 2026, the impacts on the world’s largest rainforest are expected to be particularly severe.
Record Funding and Personnel
João Paulo Sotero, director of deforestation and fire policy at Brazil’s environment ministry, told Mongabay in a video interview, “I’m not calm. I’m very alert… We are much better prepared [now] than we were in 2024 and 2025 … we are prepared for the worst scenario.”
Brazil increased funding for fire management in 2026 to 1.023 billion reais ($197 million), up 28% from 2025, or 24% after adjusting for inflation. This budget is now five times larger than it was in 2019, following the end of President Jair Bolsonaro’s term in late 2022.
The environment ministry also hired 4,410 additional federal firefighters for the 2026 fire season. In 2024, 3,224 firefighters were hired, while 4,358 were hired in 2025, making the 2026 number a record.
Targeted High-Risk Areas
According to Sotero, his team has identified high-risk locations in the Amazon to focus efforts, including an area in the south of Amazon state and around the Chapada das Mesas National Park in Maranhão state. They have also increased the number of water-bearing planes and helicopters available for firefighting.
Comparison to Previous El Niño Events
The 2023-24 El Niño event pushed several Amazonian rivers to an all-time low, isolating communities that depend on river traffic. It also fueled 2024’s worst wildfires in 20 years. A stronger El Niño could bring a similarly severe or worse drought, with the most intense effects expected between September and January, according to Carlos Nobre, the climate scientist behind the Amazon tipping point concept.
Nobre told Mongabay by phone, “We have to fight the fires,” adding that 98% of fires in the Amazon are set by humans, not electrical discharges from lightning or power lines. “The risk posed by fires is so great today that we should have policies prohibiting, for example, the financial system from financing agricultural operations that use fire.”
Brazil’s Environment Ministry said it has discussed financial incentives to link access to agricultural finance to the non-use of fire, but no such measures have been adopted. Officials also said that fire restrictions during El Niño will be up to individual states, noting that firefighters use controlled burns to reduce wildfire risks.