Amazon: Cities with 59% of deforestation adhere fully – 04/09/2024 – Environment

Municipalities responsible for 59% of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon joined the Union with Municipalities for the Reduction of Deforestation and Forest Fires program, launched by the Lula (PT) government this Tuesday (9) and which has a fund of R$ 730 million at its disposal , until 2027.

These cities will receive resources from the reduction in deforestation or the preservation of the forest, measured by the Prodes system.

The money must be allocated to creating and strengthening structures to control and combat forest destruction, land regularization and support for family farming.

As goals, municipal administrations must implement governance offices, regularize unallocated public lands and create at least 30 firefighting brigades.

The actions must also comply with the guidelines of the PPCDAm (Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Legal Amazon), created in 2004, paralyzed by the government of Jair Bolsonaro (PL) and reactivated in Lula’s third term.

According to the environment minister, Marina Silva, the intention is to encourage combat and control actions and also to encourage preservation and sustainable productive activities at the end, in dialogue with municipalities, and not just at the federal level.

“We will contain deforestation when keeping the forest standing is more profitable, more advantageous, than cutting it down,” he stated.

“It’s not enough to say what you can’t do, you need to create how it can be done,” he continued. “We want to establish what should be done, to continue generating jobs, income, improving the lives of each person who lives in the Amazon.”

The Ministry of the Environment selected 70 priority cities, which in total represent almost eight out of every ten trees felled in the Brazilian Amazon.

Of these, 53 have already joined the program — together, they are responsible for almost 60% of the destruction of the biome. The rest have until the end of April to join the program.

To join, in addition to the intention of the City Hall, the municipality needs the signature of at least one councilor (preferably the president of the Chamber), in addition to a state deputy, a federal deputy and a senator.

Of the R$730 million, R$600 million will be allocated via the Amazon Fund. The rest, through Floresta+.

Deforestation alerts in the Amazon, which have been falling for months, were reduced by 41.7% in the first quarter of 2024, with a loss of 491.8 km² of native vegetation, compared to 2023, when the rate was 844.6 km².

In the cerrado, on the other hand, the index grew 2% in the same period and reached the highest level in the historical series, started in 2019, for the first three months of the year: it went from 1,416.9 km² to 1,445.6 km². The area lost in the cerrado this year so far is equivalent to that of the city of São Paulo (1,521 km²).

The data are from the Deter system, from Inpe (National Institute for Space Research).