Brazil’s Next Deforestation Frontiers

Schneider, Maurício; Marques, Ana Alice Biedzicki de; Peres, Carlos A.

doi:10.1177/19400829211020472

Cited by 17 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…In fact, the Bill goes against a responsible development policy, leaving Brazil without: i) incentives to farmers and nature conservation; ii) effective application of command and control measures; iii) of guaranteeing a path to legality and effective enforcement of laws; protecting and strengthening environmental agencies from political influence and budgetary bottlenecks; iv) prosecuting land-grabbers and illegal gold miners, instead of promoting new loopholes for their activities and regularization of appropriated public land. It would also allow v) rejecting bills that reduce, reclassify and declassify hardwon protected areas; vi) rejecting bills that grant more amnesty for previous deforestation (Schneider, Marques & Peres, 2021); vii) rejecting bills that promote a retrogression of environmental laws and policies; viii) enacting regulations that promote strict actions to curb mining activities and deforestation in indigenous territories caused by large firms.…”

Section: Activities/sectors and The Intensification Of Defender Threatsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental defenders suffering death threats and "under protection" in the state of Pará, Eastern Amazonia, Brazil

Rodrigues

Campos

Santana

2022

Journal of Political Ecology

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Latin America has a long history of extractive and exploitative territorial activities, dating back to the colonial era. However, in the last decade there has been a steep increase in these activities, and in socio-environmental conflicts, in Latin America. There are indications of the links between the exploitation of natural resources and the violation of human rights, which materializes in the Amazon through the increase of expulsions and evictions of families, assassination attempts, murders, illegal imprisonments, intimidation, and threats. The main targets of these crimes are leaders who head the struggle to defend the rights of collectivities to land and territory, the environment, human rights and their multiple cultural and life expressions. The state of Pará (Eastern Amazonia) has appeared in the last decade as one of the states in Brazil with the highest incidence of cases of land conflicts, assassinations, aggression, defamation, and death threats directed against community leaders and environmental defenders. Thus, this article aims to quantify, characterize and reflect on the environmental defenders and community leaders suffering death threats and under legal protection in the state of Pará, Eastern Amazonia (between 2014 and 2020). It also seeks to identify the main activities and sectors that threaten these groups and the reasons behind the intensification of threats in recent years.

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Section: Activities/sectors and The Intensification Of Defender Threatsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental defenders suffering death threats and "under protection" in the state of Pará, Eastern Amazonia, Brazil

Rodrigues

Campos

Santana

2022

Journal of Political Ecology

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“…Continued deforestation in Brazilian Amazonia is largely driven by economic and political interests (Garrett et al, 2021;Schneider et al, 2021). The pace and scale of forest loss across Brazilian Amazonia is not constant due in large part to the high cultural, social and environmental heterogeneity.…”

Section: Forest Loss Is Not Associated With Economic Indicatorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Current economic development paths are leading not only to forest loss but may also lead to poverty and increased conflicts across Brazilian Amazonia (Bastos Lima et al, 2021;Rodrigues et al, 2009;Silva Junior et al, 2020). Continued agribusiness development arises (at least in part) from decades without viable economic alternatives across Brazilian Amazonia (Garrett et al, 2021;Schneider et al, 2021).…”

Section: Forest Loss Is Not Associated With Socioeconomic Indicatorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Agribusiness development is widespread, with regions experiencing agribusiness development including states not only with rapidly expanding deforestation such as Tocantins, but also the most protected Brazilian state Amapá (Schneider et al, 2021). In addition to environmental degradation, current agribusiness production chains have limited inclusiveness for the rural poor (Ferrante & Fearnside, 2019;Garrett et al, 2021;Russo Lopes et al, 2021).…”

Section: Forest Loss Is Not Associated With Socioeconomic Indicatorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Cutting down trees does not build prosperity: On the continued decoupling of Amazon deforestation and economic development in 21st century Brazil

Norris¹,

Carvalho²,

Guerrero³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Background and aims: We present evidence examining spatial and temporal patterns in forest cover changes and economic progress in Brazilian Amazonia. Specifically we tested two predictions embedded in arguments used by influential interest groups: i) where there is less forest cover economic progress should increase and ii) areas with most recent deforestation should have increased economic progress. Methods: Complementary methods assessed variation in economic progress across 794 administrative districts (municipalities) covering 4.9 Mkm2 of the Brazilian Amazon from 2002 to 2019. A representative subset of municipalities was used to compare economic and basic socioeconomic indicators across municipalities with contrasting forest coverage. Results: Contrasting results between the full and a representative subset of municipalities suggests that municipality-level economic progress cannot be directly attributed to loss of natural forests. There was no association between forest loss and economic (average salary) or basic socioeconomic indicators (existence of sanitation plans and internet connectivity). The economic progress of municipalities with less than 40% forest cover in 1986 was no different to that of similar municipalities with more than 60% forest cover from 1986 to 2019. Conclusion: The evidence contradicted both of the predictions tested. Reducing forest cover does not appear to directly promote socioeconomic progress. Any localized associations between forest cover and poverty most likely result from other more plausible alternatives including lack of opportunity and a widespread failure to effectively implement and enforce existing policies within the local socioeconomic context.Implications for Conservation: Our findings support evidence from across the tropics that show deforestation does not necessarily generate transformative and equitable food production systems or lead to poverty alleviation.

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“…Amazon biodiversity is increasingly threatened by several factors, including habitat loss and fragmentation and climate change (Dudgeon et al, 2006;Laurance et al, 2011;Li et al, 2013;Malhi et al, 2008;Michalski & Peres, 2007;Schneider et al, 2021). One of the major threats to Amazonian biodiversity identified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature is the construction of hydroelectric power plants (IUCN, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding hydropower impacts on Amazonian wildlife is limited by a lack of robust evidence: results from a systematic review

Santos

Michalski

Norris

2021

Preprint

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Background and Research Aims: Although hydropower provides energy to fuel economic development across Amazonia, strategies to minimize or mitigate impacts in highly biodiverse Amazonian environments remain unclear. The growing number of operational and planned hydroelectrics requires robust scientific evidence to evaluate impacts of these projects on Amazonian vertebrates. Here we investigated the existing scientific knowledge base documenting impacts of hydropower developments on vertebrates across Brazilian Amazonia. Methods: We reviewed the scientific literature from 1945 to 2020 published in English, Spanish and Portuguese to assess the temporal and spatial patterns in publications and the types of study design adopted as well as scientific evidence presented. Results: A total of 24 published articles documented impacts on fish (n = 20), mammals (n = 3) and freshwater turtles (n = 1). Most study designs (87.5%) lacked appropriate controls and only three studies adopted more robust Before-After-Control-Impact designs. The published evidence did not generally support causal inference with only two studies (8.3%) including appropriate controls and/or confounding variables. Conclusion: Decades of published assessments (54.2% of which were funded by hydropower developers or their subsidiaries) do not appear to have established robust evidence of impacts of hydropower developments on Amazonian vertebrates. This lack of robust evidence could limit the development of effective minimization and mitigation actions for the diverse vertebrate groups impacted by hydroelectrics across Brazilian Amazonia. Implications for Conservation: To avoid misleading inferences there is a need to integrate more robust study designs into impact assessments of hydropower developments in the Brazilian Amazon.

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Brazil’s Next Deforestation Frontiers

Cited by 17 publications

References 30 publications

Environmental defenders suffering death threats and "under protection" in the state of Pará, Eastern Amazonia, Brazil

Environmental defenders suffering death threats and "under protection" in the state of Pará, Eastern Amazonia, Brazil

Cutting down trees does not build prosperity: On the continued decoupling of Amazon deforestation and economic development in 21st century Brazil

Understanding hydropower impacts on Amazonian wildlife is limited by a lack of robust evidence: results from a systematic review

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