Motta’s agenda for voting on the critical minerals bill for Tuesday

The president of the Chamber, Hugo Motta (Republicanos-PB), scheduled for Tuesday (5) the vote on Bill (PL) 2,780/2024, which establishes the National Policy for Critical and Strategic Minerals, reported by deputy Arnaldo Jardim (Cidadania-SP).

The information is included in the week’s voting agenda, released this afternoon by the General Secretariat of the House Board. The document confirms that there will be deliberative plenary sessions from Monday (4) to Friday (8) to speed up the counting of the deadline for presenting amendments to the special commission that analyzes the Proposed Amendment to the Constitution (PEC) on a 6×1 scale, as Motta announced earlier.

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PL 2,780/2024, which the government is unhappy with, provides for “the institution of incentives for the research, mining and transformation of critical minerals and strategic minerals, and their respective production chains”.

These minerals are at the center of geopolitical discussions, because of their usefulness in the production of goods such as automobiles and technological items.

Critics of the project reported by Jardim say that the text puts national sovereignty at risk by not limiting the exploitation of Brazilian lands by foreign companies nor providing satisfactory counterparts. They also state that the State must be ensured as the manager of rare earth mining policy.

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The PT even presented a project for the Mineral Resources Research Company (CPRM) to be renamed the Brazilian Rare Earth Mining Company (Terrabras), with the aim of managing strategic reserves in accordance with Union guidelines.

However, as shown by the Political Broadcastthe government base has heard from Palácio do Planalto that defending Terrabras now is not “tactical” and that the concern, at the moment, is to establish in the Jardim project the role of the State as a driver of investments.