location: Brazil

location: Brazil

Social media activity version | Lean version

Extractive industries look at degraded land to avoid further deforestation in the Pan Amazon
- Mining and power generation companies invest in the Amazon because it is profitable. But their development is costly, so before setting up, the companies evaluate not only the richness of the mineral deposit but also the volume of the geological formation. In this way they estimate the return on such investment before disbursing the financial capital.
- At the same time, investors tend to mismanage social and environmental risks associated with projects, with opposition from civil society frequently delaying extractive initiatives.
- Large expanses of the Amazon are still considered wilderness and any sort of development will trigger robust opposition from local, national and international organizations. Various factors influence whether an extractive company will pursue a greenfield development (exploring virgin land) or brownfield development (an area already used by the industry).

Despite drought, Amazon deforestation alerts hit five-year low
- The Brazilian Amazon experienced a 47% decrease in deforestation in April compared to last year, marking the lowest level in five years, and a 51% decrease over the past 12 months.
- Since President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office in January 2023, his administration has effectively curbed deforestation by reinstating conservation programs, strengthening environmental agencies, and supporting Indigenous rights.
- The decline in deforestation occurred despite a severe drought affecting the region, which includes record fires in the state of Roraima.

Research shows the Caatinga is Brazil’s most efficient carbon capture biome
- Studies found that for every 100 metric tons of CO2 absorbed by dried-out forests in the semiarid area of Brazil’s northeasern region, 45-60 metric tons do not return to the atmosphere; in the Amazon Rainforest, the balance between carbon absorption and release ranges from 2-11%, compared with 23% in the Cerrado biome.
- According to researchers, the Caatinga’s vegetation stores 8,677 metric tons of carbon per square mile [3,350 per square kilometer], which can be released in the event of deforestation — a problem that increased by 2,500% from 2019 to2022, making the Caatinga Brazil’s third-most deforested biome.
- The solutions suggested to preserve the Caatinga include social carbon credit programs, new conservation units, and degraded areas recovered through agroecology.

Brazil takes pioneering action — and a vaccine — to rewild howler monkeys
- Brown howler monkeys (Alouatta guariba), endemic to the Atlantic Forest in Brazil and Argentina, became one of the 25 most threatened primate species following a yellow fever outbreak in late 2016.
- In response, Brazilian government agencies and other conservation organizations launched a nationwide population management plan, the first of its kind in the country, focused on coordinating captive facilities with experts who could relocate animals to areas where populations have vanished or declined.
- Nationwide management of howler monkeys was made possible by the adaptation of a vaccine — originally developed for humans — against the yellow fever virus.
- Howler reintroduction initiatives in Brazil have already begun showing signs of success.

Is the extractive sector really favorable for the Pan Amazon’s economy?
- The Pan Amazon is an important source for several key industrial raw materials. Although financially, its minerals sector is minor within the world economy, the economy of Amazonian countries is highly dependent on extractive activities.
- Extractive industries in the region play a strategic role. Without them, Brazil would suffer a major economic disruption from mineral revenues, and the impact would be catastrophic for Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia.
- Most other countries in the Pan Amazon region return only a portion of royalties from revenues to local jurisdictions, while corporate income taxes go to the central government. However, despite criticism on lack of investment in Amazonian hinterlands, local governments continue to support extractive industries.
- None of the money from royalties is allocated to conservation, nor is any allocated to the remediation of the environmental impacts linked to its exploitation.

Secrets from the rainforest’s past uncovered in Amazonian backyards
- Riverbank communities in Amazonas and Rondônia are helping to piece together the puzzle of human presence in the rainforest over the last 10,000 years with archaeological remains found in their backyards and nearby their homes.
- Preserved in household museums, pottery fragments compose a collective project drawing together scientists and communities seeking to understand Amazonia’s past.
- Ancestral soils known as Amazonian Dark Earths with remains of farming and food preparation are offering clues about how humans transformed the forest over time

Indigenous leader’s killer is convicted in Brazil, but tensions over land remain
- Bar owner João Carlos da Silva was on April 15 sentenced to 18 years in prison for the murder of Indigenous land defender and teacher Ari Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau four years earlier.
- Ari’s murder became symbolic of the struggle land defenders in Brazil face when protecting their ancestral territories, including constant threats and sometimes deadly violence.
- The Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau Indigenous Territory faces fresh threats after a national lawmaker claimed its current boundaries are wrong and vowed to reduce the area in favor of local cattle ranchers and farmers.
- It’s one of several territorial setbacks that Indigenous lands across Brazil are currently facing; others include a territory in Paraná state whose demarcation process has been suspended, and one in Bahía state that could potentially be auctioned off.

Indonesian palm oil, Brazilian beef top contributors to U.S. deforestation exposure
- A new report reveals that the United States imported palm oil, cattle products, soybeans, cocoa, rubber, coffee and corn linked to an area of tropical deforestation the size of Los Angeles between October 2021 and November 2023.
- Palm oil from Indonesia was the largest contributor to deforestation, followed by Brazil due to cattle grazing.
- The report by Trase, commissioned by Global Witness, found that the U.S. continues to import deforestation-linked commodities while awaiting the passage of the FOREST Act, which aims to prohibit imports of products linked to illegal deforestation.
- Experts emphasize the need for action from companies, governments, financial institutions and citizens to stop commodity-driven forest loss, urging support for smallholders, increased transparency in supply chains, and the passage of the FOREST Act in the U.S.

‘Our rights are on trial in Brazil’: Interview with Indigenous movement pioneer Brasílio Priprá
- In an interview with Mongabay, Brasílio Priprá, one of the pioneers of the Free Land Camp, the largest event of the Brazilian Indigenous movement, looks back on its 20 years of existence.
- Priprá, who has been active in the Indigenous movement for 40 years, has seen few changes, but enough to keep fighting for his rights.
- Land demarcation has been the main demand over the two decades of the Free Land Camp. Since 2019, marco temporal, a legal thesis that aims to restrict Indigenous land rights, has made this demand more pressing.
- Priprá shares his thoughts on the impacts of marco temporal on Indigenous rights, Brazil’s environmental goals and the future of the country for all citizens.

New ban threatens traditional fishers in Brazil’s Mato Grosso state
- Legislation in effect since Jan. 1 has banned fishing in Mato Grosso state rivers for five years, with heavy opposition from environmental defenders and traditional fishers.
- The bill affects part of the Brazilian Amazon Rainforest, the Cerrado savanna and part of the Pantanal wetland, one of the largest continuous wet areas on the planet.
- Experts consider fishers in the region guardians of the rivers and fear the bill could eliminate traditional fishing in the state.

In Brazil, half a century of salt mining sinks a city, displacing thousands
- Decades of salt mining in Maceió, in northeastern Brazil, have led to earthquakes and cracks in several of the city’s neighborhoods, making buildings there unhabitable. As a result, about 60,000 people have been displaced.
- Braskem, the chemical giant that acquired the original salt mining company, has agreed with authorities to clean up the affected neighborhoods and compensate locals. But those affected complain that Braskem has offered them meager amounts, with no negotiation; the sums don’t cover the value of their properties, while compensation for moral damage is also extremely low.
- Locals indirectly affected do not receive compensation and continue to suffer losses, as properties within a 1-kilometer (0.6-mile) radius around the disaster zone can no longer be insured and lose value; businesses adjacent to the now unhabitable neighborhoods have also lost customers.

State management and regulation of extractive industries in the Pan Amazon
- Extractive industries have become economic and political pillars across all Pan Amazon countries. Relationships between states and private companies in the region are managed via three main models: concessions, production sharing agreements, and service contracts, with the usage of those models varying across the region.
- In all cases, corruption, bad governance and adverse social conditions prevent the exploitation of resources in the Pan Amazon from being sustainable and generating real wealth.
- States capture revenues from extractive industries in different ways: via royalties, corporate income taxes and profits from state-owned companies. These are complimented by licensing fees, property taxes and signing bonuses as well as windfall-profit taxes.

Education & research bring Rio’s dolphins back from the brink of extinction
- The Guiana dolphin (Sotalia guianensis) is one of the most common cetaceans in Brazil but also one of the most vulnerable, with numbers dwindling by up to 93% in the last 40 years.
- One of the worst affected regions is Guanabara Bay, in Rio de Janeiro, where Guiana dolphins face daily industrial contamination, sewage and noise pollution, causing chronic stress that leads to weakened immune systems and reproduction difficulties.
- A recently published study found high toxin concentrations in Guiana dolphins in neighboring Sepetiba Bay, which has significantly impacted the health of the population, the researchers found.
- Environmentalists are banking on research and education to help protect the species and consequently the marine environment. So far, a protected environment in Sepetiba Bay has helped stem dolphin mortality, and efforts are being made in Guanabara to clean up the bay, but more is required to restore and save the population.

Apologies aren’t enough, Indigenous people say of Brazil dictatorship’s crimes
- After the Brazilian state apologized for the crimes perpetrated during the military dictatorship, the Krenak and Guarani-Kaiowá Indigenous peoples are demanding the demarcation of their territories.
- The Krenak were tortured during the military regime, while the Guarani-Kaiowá were enslaved by farmers; both were forced from their lands.
- Violations also affected Indigenous peoples such as the Avá-Canoeiro, who were driven to the brink of extinction by years of persecution.

Meet the 2024 Goldman Environmental Prize Winners
- This year marks the 35th anniversary of the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize, which honors one grassroots activist from each of the six inhabited continents.
- The 2023 prize winners are Alok Shukla from India, Andrea Vidaurre from the U.S., Marcel Gomes from Brazil, Murrawah Maroochy Johnson from Australia, Teresa Vicente from Spain, and Nonhle Mbuthuma and Sinegugu Zukulu from South Africa.

Goldman Prize honors Brazilian investigation linking JBS & deforestation
- Marcel Gomes, the executive secretary at investigative journalism outlet Repórter Brasil, is one of this year’s prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize winners.
- Gomes coordinated an international investigation in December 2021 on JBS’ beef chain, using a powerful data platform on Brazilian livestock, investigative teams in different countries and a grassroots network of Indigenous communities, local NGOs and small-scale farmers.
- In an interview with Mongabay, Marcel Gomes said the Repórter Brasil series pressured big European retailers to stop selling illegally sourced JBS beef and public authorities to monitor big beef companies.
- Also known as the “Green Nobel Prize,” the Goldman Environmental Prize honored five other environmental activists on April 29.

Afro-Brazilian communities fight a rain of pesticides & the company behind it
- Quilombola communities in the Sapê do Norte region of Brazil’s Espírito Santo state have been reporting toxic crop dusting by pulp and paper company Suzano on its eucalyptus plantations.
- Inhabitants speak of damage to their gardens, dried-up water sources, dead fish and diseases.
- The use of aerial pesticide application has been prohibited in the EU since 2009; in Brazil, the number of people affected by the practice increased by 86% between 2021 and 2022.

Amid record-high fires across the Amazon, Brazil loses primary forests
- The number of fires shows no signs of easing as Brazil’s Roraima faces unprecedented blazes, and several Amazonian countries, including Guyana, Suriname and Venezuela, registered record-high outbreaks in the first quarter this year.
- Fire outbreaks in primary (old-growth) forest in Brazil’s Amazon soared by 152% in 2023, according to a recent study, rising from 13,477 in 2022 to 34,012 in 2023.
- Fires in the mature forest regions are the leading drivers of degradation of the Amazon Rainforest because the biome hasn’t evolved to adapt to such blazes, according to the researchers.
- The fires are a result of a drought that has been fueled by climate change and worsened by natural weather phenomena, such as El Niño, which has intensified dry conditions already aggravated by high temperatures across the world, experts say.

A web of front people conceals environmental offenders in the Amazon
- A paper trail left by a notorious land grabber reveals how he used relatives and an employee as fronts to evade environmental fines and lawsuits, shedding light on this widespread practice in the Brazilian Amazon.
- Fronts prevent the real criminals from having their assets seized to pay for environmental fines, besides consuming time and resources from the authorities, who spend years trying to prove who the real financier of the deforestation is.
- Experts say it’s best to go after environmental offenders where it hurts the most, by seizing their assets, rather than to chase down their true identity.
- This investigation is part of a partnership between Mongabay and Repórter Brasil.

Brazil boosts protection of Amazon mangroves with new reserves in Pará state
- The state of Pará has created two new conservation areas along the Amazonian coastline, placing almost all of its mangroves under federal protection.
- The two reserves mean that an additional 74,700 hectares (184,600 acres) have been included in the largest and most conserved continuous belt of mangroves on the planet.
- The process to create the reserves took more than 13 years and faced several setbacks; the final outcome has been celebrated by environmentalists as a victory for local communities and biodiversity.
- The new extractive reserves allow resident populations to engage in traditional and sustainable extractive practices such as fishing and hunting, while keeping out big businesses, such as commercial aquaculture or logging.

Deforestation alerts in the Brazilian Amazon fall to a 5-year low
- Forest clearing detected by Brazil’s deforestation alert system fell to the lowest level in nearly five years.
- According to data released last week by the country’s space agency, INPE, deforestation registered over the past twelve months amounts to 4,816 square kilometers, 53% below the level this time last year.
- The drop in deforestation has occurred despite a severe drought affecting much of the Amazon basin.

Cross-border Indigenous efforts in Peru & Brazil aim to protect isolated groups
- Indigenous organizations in Peru and Brazil are joining forces to push their respective governments to safeguard the Yavarí-Tapiche Territorial Corridor, which covers 16 million hectares (39.5 million acres) across both countries.
- The cross-border initiative aims to protect the ancestral territories of Indigenous peoples in isolation and initial contact who travel freely across both borders and are threatened by those who engage in illegal activity in or near their territories.
- The Indigenous organizations plan to create a commission, made up of groups from both sides of the border, to exchange knowledge and define cross-border Indigenous policies for the protection of isolated peoples, such as measures to prevent territorial invasions and collaborate on health matters.

How predatory fishing has decimated Brazil coastal fish populations for decades
- A study by the ReefSYN group analyzed reef fish landings between 1950 and 2015, finding significant changes in the species caught.
- Reduced catch volumes, increased diversity of species and catches of small fish at the bottom of the food chain indicate unsustainable fishing.
- The lack of updated official data since 2015 makes fisheries management, monitoring and control more difficult in Brazil, but new measures by the Ministries of Fisheries and the Environment aim to improve this scenario.

Report links H&M and Zara to major environmental damage in biodiverse Cerrado
- A report by U.K. investigative NGO Earthsight links supply chains of fashion giants H&M and Zara to large-scale illegal deforestation, land-grabbing, violence and corruption in Brazil.
- The country’s Cerrado region, home to a third of Brazil’s species, has already lost half of its vegetation to large-scale agriculture and is under increasing pressure from a booming cotton industry.
- The two major producers linked to illicit activities, SLC Agrícola and Grupo Horita, deny the accusations, as does Abrapa, Brazil’s producer association, which also oversees cotton certification implementation in the country.
- Earthsight found that most of the tainted cotton it tracked had the Better Cotton label, raising the alarm over the practices and traceability of the certification system.

The environmental mismanagement of enduring oil industry impacts in the Pan Amazon
- The history of extractivism in the Pan Amazon shows that environmental damage has been commonplace, only now there are new demands from the parent companies that influence all service providers involved.
- In this section, Killeen explains that any hydrocarbon project (whether oil or gas) entails a high risk of social conflict with the communities living next to exploration and exploitation areas.
- The governments of countries such as Ecuador, Peru, Colombia and Brazil must ensure that there is real environmental responsibility for the oil spills that are damaging ecosystems and the livelihoods of communities.

Brazil’s illegal gold trade takes a hammering, but persists underground
- Measures throughout 2023 to curb the illegal gold trade in Brazil led to a 20% drop in the country’s exports of the precious metal.
- In Itaituba, the hub of the Amazon illegal gold trade, taxes from gold sales fell by more than 90% in just the first quarter of this year.
- Experts attribute this drop to police raids on illegal mining operations and on requirements for sellers to issue electronic invoices.
- But they warn the illegal gold still persists, shifting to unofficial channels to evade the eye of regulators.

Climate change could drive mammal extinction in Brazil’s Caatinga, study warns
- According to a new study, 91.6% of terrestrial mammal communities in the Caatinga will lose species by 2060, with 87% of them being deprived of their habitats if the temperature in the region increases by at least 2°C.
- Small mammals will suffer the strongest impact, and some species may disappear from the biome, such as the giant anteater and the giant armadillo.
- In addition to more drought and rising temperatures, deforestation caused by wind farms also threatens some species, such as the jaguar.
- In a previous study, the same researchers had warned that 99% of plant communities in the Caatinga will lose species by 2060.

Between Brazil’s Caatinga & Cerrado, communities profit from native fruits
- People from the Caatinga, geraizeiros, veredeiros, Quilombolas and Indigenous communities in the northern region of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, have been generating income by harvesting native fruits such as umbu, buriti, coquinho azedo and pequi.
- The Grande Sertão Cooperative serves as the primary purchaser of this produce, spanning 36 municipalities and supporting approximately 2,000 families. During the last harvest, the cooperative processed 700,000 kilograms (1.5 million pounds) of pequi.
- Building the kitchen, laying the floor or buying a cupboard are common reports from the extractivist women who benefit from their new profits; they now make money from fruit that used to go to waste.
- Valuing native species also plays a crucial role in preserving the health of threatened biomes; for instance, the Caatinga is currently the third-most-deforested biome in Brazil, and approximately half of the Cerrado has already been lost.

New technologies to map environmental crime in the Amazon Basin (commentary)
- Environmental crimes like land grabbing, illegal deforestation, and poaching hinder climate action, deter investment in sustainable practices, and threaten biodiversity across major biomes worldwide.
- Despite challenges such as vast territories difficult to police and weak rule of law, new technologies like geospatial and predictive analytics are being leveraged to enhance the detection and disruption of these activities.
- Innovative approaches, including public-private partnerships and AI tools, show promise in improving real-time monitoring and enforcement, although they require increased investment and training to be truly effective, argue Robert Muggah and Peter Smith of Instituto Igarapé, a “think and do tank” in Brazil.
- This post is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

A short walk through Amazon time: Interview with archaeologist Anna Roosevelt
- Anna Roosevelt has been working in the Amazon for four decades and her pivotal research has changed the knowledge of the rainforest’s occupation.
- In an interview with Mongabay, she explains how her research led to evidence of much older Amazon settlements than previously thought, challenging a decades-long scientific consensus about how Indigenous people related to the forest.
- “One reason I was able to make some great discoveries is because of how opinionated archaeologists in the mid-20th century were. I only benefited from their mistakes,” she said.
- Roosevelt said the recent hype regarding the “garden cities” in Ecuador is “annoying”, as it is not a new discovery and it ignores older research from Latin American archaeologists.

Brazil’s cattle industry could suffer major losses without climate policies, report says
- Domestic beef production in Brazil could drop by 25% by 2050 as governments and the private sector look to step up climate change and forest conservation strategies, according to a new report from Orbitas, an initiative from Climate Advisers.
- Deforestation from cattle ranching could lead to hotter, drier conditions that worsen cattle health. It could also reduce soil productivity needed for growing animal feed, the report said.
- The industry has to invest in new technological and management techniques in order to prevent major losses.

Tapirs in Brazil’s Cerrado inspire research on human health & pesticides
- Recent research has revealed human contamination by pesticides in the Brazilian Cerrado, following a previous study that also found contamination in tapirs in the region.
- This research shows how animals are providing information and inspiration for research with humans, while emphasizing that the stress endured by South America’s largest terrestrial mammal is also evidenced in people.
- Despite inspiring research on human health, tapirs themselves are not free from the challenges to their survival imposed by human actions; the species is classified as threatened by the IUCN Red List and qualified as vulnerable to extinction.
- The former president of the Brazilian federal environmental protection agency, IBAMA, says the approval of a bill that made the use of pesticides more flexible in Brazil could worsen situations like those reported by the researchers.

Illegal mining in the Pan Amazon: an ecological disaster for floodplains and local communities
- Floodplains are extraordinarily productive because they are the connection between aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. They are socially and economically vital because tens of thousands of families depend on their natural resources for their livelihoods.
- However, placer mining – as Killeen explains in this section – generates catastrophic impacts when miners remove and turn over topsoil as they search for gold sediments. The most optimistic estimate is that 350,000 hectares of forest and wetlands have been lost in the Pan Amazon region as a result.
- Although visible on the banks of rivers and their headwaters, the damage caused by mercury is invisible when it comes to the health of miners, their families and communities. In reviewing 33 studies conducted in the Tapajós watershed, Killeen found that high levels of mercury were widespread.
- Remediation can be very costly economically and politically, as governments need to take measures against illegal mining and protect affected communities.

New FPIC guide designed to help protect Indigenous rights as mineral mining booms
- In the face of growing demand for critical minerals, Indigenous organizations developed a guide to help Indigenous communities implement their free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) when investors visit their lands for potential mining projects.
- Of the 30 metals and minerals needed to feed these technologies, about 54% are on and near Indigenous and peasant lands, according to a study published in Nature.
- The guide helps communities mold the FPIC framework to their governance and value systems and provides them with a “menu of options,” including preparations in advance of investor meetings, how to work through the negotiation process, steps to consider after a decision and a framework to agree on benefits of a project.
- By not following the FPIC process, companies open themselves up to operational, political, legal, reputational and investment risk when Indigenous activists protest their activities, a legal expert says.

A tiger cat gains new species designation, but conservation challenges remain
- Two Latin American tiger cat species were previously recognized by science in 2013: the southern tiger cat (Leopardus guttulus) and northern tiger cat (Leopardus tigrinus). Both are considered vulnerable according to the IUCN Red List.
- But a paper published in January 2024 described a third, new tiger cat species; Leopardus pardinoides. Dubbed the clouded tiger cat, the species is found in high-altitude cloud forests in Central and South America. This taxonomic reshuffling has major conservation implications for the group as a whole, said experts.
- In addition to proposing the new species, the authors reassessed the tiger cats’ distribution and current status. New data indicate that the small wildcats are not present in areas where they were previously assumed to be, which has slashed their remaining habitat considerably.
- Experts warn that these little-known wildcat species have long flown under the conservation radar. Urgent action is required to protect them in the long term against a litany of threats, including habitat loss, persecution and disease transmission from domestic animals.

Mining in the Pan Amazon in pursuit of the world’s most precious metal
- Gold exploitation is usually carried out by large mining companies with dedicated subsidiaries. However, the exploration companies in charge of discovering the ore are usually small specialized companies.
- The environmental and social impacts of corporate gold mines are similar to those of other industrial polymetallic mines; they vary though according to the type of mining – underground or at the surface – and to the type of ecosystems they overlap.
- Illegal miners are the source of two of the most insidious environmental and social impacts associated with the extractive industries in the Pan Amazon: floodplain destruction and mercury pollution. About 20% of total annual gold production comes from illegal mining.

Tropical forest loss puts 2030 zero-deforestation target further out of reach
- The overall rate of primary forest loss across the tropics remained stubbornly high in 2023, putting the world well off track from its net-zero deforestation target by 2030, according to a new report from the World Resources Institute.
- The few bright spots were Brazil and Colombia, where changes in political leadership helped drive down deforestation rates in the Amazon.
- Elsewhere, however, several countries hit record-high rates of forest loss, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bolivia and Laos, driven largely by agriculture, mining and fires.
- The report authors call for “bold global mechanisms and unique local initiatives … to achieve enduring reductions in deforestation across all tropical front countries.”

Mato Grosso shelves environmental license application for Amazon dam
- The Mato Grosso government has halted the licensing for the Castanheira hydropower plant, proposed for construction in the Juruena River Basin, which would flood a 95-km2 [37-square-mile] area and directly affect Indigenous and rural communities in northern Mato Grosso state.
- Social movements in the area see this as a victory in a struggle that lasted more than a decade.
- The fact that the project was shelved does not mean it has been put to rest; Brazil’s Ministry of Mines and Energy may still resubmit plans for the construction of the dam.

Brazil’s Cerrado is main beneficiary of 2021 pledge to end deforestation
- The Financial Innovation for Amazonia, the Cerrado and Chaco, or IFACC, has allocated $234.5 million for projects aimed at expanding agriculture to already deforested land in Brazil’s Cerrado grasslands.
- First announced at the COP26 climate summit in 2021, the initiative aims to place small farms on the sustainability agenda by showing that it’s possible to increase profit without clearing native vegetation.
- Funded projects include soybean farming on degraded pastureland and financial incentives for farmers who maintain more preserved native vegetation on their land than the minimum required by law.

Cerrado mammals change their habits to escape humans, study shows
- A study that observed five species of mammals in northeast São Paulo state reveals that most animals change their routines to escape contact with humans, usually by adopting nocturnal habits.
- For the giant anteater, the biggest disturbance factor is the presence of dogs that roam free in rural areas and end up hunting and scaring wildlife away.
- Despite the adaptation attempts, animals do not evolve at the same pace as habitat destruction, which can lead to the animals’ extinction.

Agribusiness bill moves to block grassland protections in Brazilian biomes
- The Brazilian Congress is analyzing a bill that would leave all the country’s non-forestry vegetation unprotected, affecting an area twice the size of the United Kingdom.
- Behind the proposal are the interests of economic sectors such as agribusiness and real estate companies.
- The most affected biome would be the Pantanal wetlands, a Natural World Heritage Site known for its highly biodiverse grasslands and flooded fields.

Amazon prosecutors get sharper impact tool to charge illegal gold dealers
- New research from the NGO Conservation Strategy fund, working with federal prosecutors in Brazil, has refined a tool that puts a dollar value on the socioenvironmental costs of illegal gold mining across vital ecosystems in the Amazon.
- Brazilian environmental investigators and prosecutors say the updated Mining Impacts Calculator is improving cases they’re bringing against the largest buyers of illegal gold in the country.
- Each kilogram of gold of artisanal mining causes damage valued at up to $389,200, more than twice the market value of gold, the new study found.
- Prosecutors in Colombia, Peru, Ecuador and other Amazonian countries are also adopting the new calculator, but with gold values soaring and official corruption entrenched, observers say that reducing illegal mining will remain a significant challenge.

The environmental and social liabilities of the extractive sector
- Many environmental advocates consistently oppose mining and hydrocarbon development because they believe that the Amazon should remain intact. A similar view is held by Indigenous peoples, who fear that their communities will be transformed by immigrants or altered by catastrophes that will damage their livelihoods.
- Despite numerous initiatives and significant investment in redesigning tailings storage facilities and improving risk management, the number of incidents classified as ‘serious’ or ‘very serious’ has increased over the last thirty years.
- Long-term liabilities created by mining must be remediated – as is the case of tailings storage facilities – or offset, for example, where habitat loss can be compensated by creating a protected area with similar biodiversity.

‘Planting water, eating Caatinga & irrigating with the sun’: Interview with agroecologist Tião Alves
- In an interview with Mongabay, Brazilian agroecologist Tião Alves tells how he has been teaching thousands of rural workers to survive in the Caatinga biome, severely afflicted by drought, climate change and desertification.
- At the head of Serta, one of the most important agroecology schools in the Brazilian Northeast, he teaches low-cost technologies that ensure food security with a minimum of resources, both natural and financial.
- Currently, 13% of the Caatinga is already in the process of desertification, the result of a combination of deforestation, inadequate irrigation, extreme droughts and changes in the global climate.

How to reward tropical forest conservation: Interview with Tasso Azevedo
- A new initiative led by Brazil’s Ministry of the Environment plans to financially reward conservationists of the planet’s tropical forests.
- In an interview with Mongabay, one of the system’s creators, Tasso Azevedo, details the financial instrument, called Tropical Forests Forever.
- Countries that join the system will receive a fixed amount for each hectare of forest preserved or recovered, but the amount will be deducted if they allow deforestation.
- The Brazilian government estimates that $250 billion is needed to kickstart the operation.

Deforestation from soy shows no sign of stopping in Cerrado, report says
- A recent report from Mighty Earth shows that approximately 26,901 hectares (66,473 acre) suffered deforestation and forest degradation in the Cerrado between last September and December, while 30,031 hectares (74,208 acres) were affected in the Amazon.
- Mighty Earth, in partnership with AidEnvironment and Repórter Brasil, are monitoring short-term soy and cattle ranching activities contributing to deforestation, aiming to highlight recent forest loss cases every three months.
- The report called for improved regulations that protect savanna biomes like the Cerrado, not just the Amazon Rainforest.

Lula’s deforestation goals threatened by frustrated environmental agents
- Brazilian environmental agents worked hard in 2023 to control the Amazon deforestation, with impressive results that President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has used to promote himself in the international arena.
- But since early January, these public servants went on strike, claiming their salaries do not make up for their risky and highly-qualified work, in a threat to Lula’s zero deforestation target.
- The workers’ movement has provoked a sharp decrease in environmental fines, besides affecting the licensing of infrastructure works and the importing of vehicles.

Fanned by El Niño, megafires in Brazil threaten Amazon’s preserved areas
- Researchers and protection agencies expected a dry season with more fires in Brazil’s Roraima state at the start of 2024, but the effects of an intense and prolonged El Niño have aggravated the situation.
- In February alone, the number of hotspots detected in this northernmost Amazonian state hit an all-time high of 2,057.
- According to IBAMA, Brazil’s federal environmental agency, 23% of the outbreaks recorded in Roraima are in Indigenous areas, affecting at least 13 territories.
- The Roraima state government says controlled fires in private areas are allowed with a permit, but the large number of fires this year indicates criminal activity.

Fires surge in the Amazon, but deforestation continues to fall
- Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has continued on a downward trajectory despite a sharp increase in fires associated with the severe drought in the region.
- According to data published by Brazil’s National Space Research Institute (INPE) earlier this month, forest loss in the Brazilian Amazon amounted to 5,010 square kilometers over the past twelve months, the lowest level recorded since May 2019.
- Despite the declining rate of forest loss, fires in the Amazon are on the rise, driven by the severe drought gripping the region.
- Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has fallen precipitously since Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva replaced Jair Bolsonaro as president last year.

Brazilian youngsters discuss how they are tackling the climate emergency
- Affected by drought, pollution, high waters and floods, young people from different Brazilian states describe how climate change is impacting their routines and causing illness, malnutrition, displacement and school disruption.
- According to a UNICEF report, 2 billion children and adolescents in the world are exposed to risks arising from the climate emergency; in Brazil, there are 40 million affected children and adolescents — 60% of Brazilians under 18.
- According to experts, the climate crisis is a crisis of the rights of children and adolescents, as it affects everything from the right to decent housing and health care to education and food, leading to problems in child development and learning abilities.

Brazil’s Amazonian states push for court reforms in bid for justice
- Brazil’s Supreme Court has sworn in Flávio Dino, the first justice of the country’s highest court with an Amazonian background in almost 20 years.
- Amazonian states have gone largely unrepresented at the top of the Brazilian judicial system for decades, a political distortion that has spurred calls for reform.
- Federal courts are of special interest in the Amazon because illegal activity in the region tends to be intertwined with environmental, Indigenous, mining and land reform issues — all of which fall under federal jurisdiction.
- The lack of federal courts of appeal in the Amazon and the large distances that people have to travel to access justice have long been a common complaint among Amazonian lawyers, public defenders, judges and politicians.

How a wind farm on Brazil’s coast erased a fishing village from the map
- Environmental authorities approved what was then the largest wind farm in Brazil’s Ceará state in 2002 without assessing its socioenvironmental impact, including on the local fishing community and the ecosystem.
- The community resisted and ended up receiving unusual compensation that nonetheless failed to resolve the permanent problems and triggered internal conflicts.
- With support from a state university, the residents have fought against their erasure from the official records, but today are entitled to the use of a smaller territory than they had before, and have lost access to natural resources like lagoons.

Reforestation and restoration: Two ways to make the Pan Amazon greener
- Mongabay is publishing a new edition of the book, “A Perfect Storm in the Amazon,” in short installments and in three languages: Spanish, English and Portuguese.
- Efforts to save agroforestry zones require long-term patience and heavy investment, but ensure that plantations sequester up to 20% of the carbon stored in a natural forest, and even more carbon can be retained through natural habitat restoration.
- Killeen explains that tropical areas need to retain around 70% of their canopy cover to maintain the atmospheric recycling that sustains historical rainfall levels. In the southern Amazon, this would need to be applied to 15 million hectares with an investment of between $20 and $100 billion.
- For the author, these issues are all the more urgent as the threat of climate change is accelerating the Pan-Amazonian region to an irreversible tipping point. Are carbon markets providing incentives that ‘reward’ conservation in the Pan-Amazonian region?

Reconciling conservation agriculture and agroforestry for sustainability
- Mongabay is publishing a new edition of the book, “A Perfect Storm in the Amazon,” in short installments and in three languages: Spanish, English and Portuguese.
- In this section, Killeen focuses on land management that seeks to reconcile the technologies of modern agriculture with the worn-out practices of organic farming.
- It also analyzes the case of livestock farmers, who are not as likely to change their land management practices, as they have an underutilized surplus that has suffered from mismanagement.
- For Killeen, smallholder farmers should be more willing to diversify such production systems and adopt practices that increase resilience. Because mitigating risk is essential to their livelihoods: without crops comes bankruptcy and hunger. This is the case in countries such as Ecuador and Peru, where smallholder farmers occupy more than 90% of previously deforested areas.

Squeezed-out Amazon smallholders seek new frontiers in Brazil’s Roraima state
- As infrastructure projects and soy plantations pump up land values in the Brazilian Amazon, smallholders are selling up and moving to more distant frontiers, perpetuating a cycle of displacement and deforestation.
- The isolated south of Roraima state has become a priority destination for these migrants, who buy land from informal brokers with questionable paperwork; much of the land has been grabbed from the vast undesignated lands of the Brazilian government.
- Although the appetite for land grabs has diminished since the start of the Lula administration, the region has seen an increase in deforestation in recent years.

Brazil risks losing the Pampa grassland to soy farms and sand patches
- Nearly a third of the Brazilian portion of South America’s Pampa grassland has been lost since 1985, largely to agricultural expansion and forestry plantations.
- This biome is often overlooked in comparison to the higher-profile Amazon, Pantanal and Cerrado landscapes, but has greater plant diversity than the others.
- The expansion of agriculture may also be exacerbating an age-old problem in the Pampa, which is the spread of barren, sandy patches of land.
- Efforts to reverse this process, known as arenization, often involve growing eucalyptus plantations, but experts say this commercial approach solves nothing.

Riverine communities join forces to preserve threatened Amazon turtles
- Residents of 32 communities in Juruti, western Pará state, organize to preserve species such as the Amazon turtle (Podocnemis expansa), tracajá (P. unifilis), pitiú (P. sextuberculata) and irapuca (P. erythrocephala).
- Monitoring beaches during the spawning season to collect eggs and then take them to a protected hatchery are the main actions of riverside dwellers. The numbers are on the rise: Some communities have already protected 300 nests in a single season.
- The Brazilian Amazon is a priority area for chelonian conservation, with 21 species described by scientists. Fourteen species live in Juruti, one of which is endemic.
- Despite being banned by environmental legislation, consumption of turtle eggs and meat still seems to be part of local traditions, contributing to reduce the number of individuals; mining and dam construction projects also threat the survival of the species.

Project retraces Darwin’s voyage, educating young conservation leaders
- The DARWIN200 Project is retracing English naturalist Charles Darwin’s 19th-century voyage, stopping at 32 ports around the globe by 2025.
- The sailing ship’s crew is composed of 200 young people who work in environmental conservation around the world, taking turns aboard the vessel to learn about projects in the places where they moor.
- Mongabay visited the ship as it passed through Rio de Janeiro together with Sarah Darwin, Charles Darwin’s great-great-granddaughter.

Fishers’ memories on par with scientific data on historic catches: Study
- A new study investigated how the memories of about 400 fishers from traditional communities in Brazil can serve as sources of data on historic fishing effort and catch size.
- It measured the reliability of this “harvest recall data” by comparing it to other data collected by standard scientific methods.
- The researchers found that when considered as a whole, the fishers’ memories agreed with standard data collection methods about 95% of the time, which suggests that this recall method can be an effective fisheries management tool.

Migratory Amazonian catfish placed on the international protection list
- The gilded and piramutaba catfish (Brachyplatystoma rousseauxii and B. vaillantii, respectively) were recently placed on the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species (CMS) list, also known as the Bonn Convention.
- These fish carry out the longest freshwater migration on the planet: The gilded or “dorado” travels 11,000 kilometers (6,800 miles) between the mouth of the Amazon River and the foot of the Andes to lay its eggs; the piramutaba swims 5,500 km (3,400 mi).
- Both species are endangered due to overfishing and construction of hydroelectric plants on rivers in the Amazon; the dorado’s distribution range has shrunk by 37% because of the dams.

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