RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Atlantic Forest, the most ravaged biome in Brazil, lost the equivalent of 18,000 soccer fields between 2019 and 2020, as shown by data from the Atlantic Forest Atlas released on Wednesday, May 26. A total of 13,053 hectares of native forest were cleared, 9% less than recorded in the preceding period.
Despite the reduction, the figure is still 14% higher than observed between 2017 and 2018, when deforestation reached its lowest level in 36 years (11,399 hectares).
According to the report, the loss of vegetation cover is stable, but at a high rate for a biome that is currently highly threatened and plays a central role in mitigating the climate emergency and conserving biodiversity.
The survey, conducted by the SOS Mata Atlântica Foundation in partnership with the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), is based on satellite images to analyze the forest remnants larger than 3 hectares, which are located in 17 states. The detection of deforestation occurs by comparing images from earlier periods.
Of the 13,000 hectares deforested in the period, 91% are concentrated in only 5 states. Minas Gerais is first, with 4,700 hectares cut down, followed by Bahia (3,200), Paraná (2,100), Santa Catarina (887), and Mato Grosso do Sul (851).
“In these places, the main vector of deforestation is agricultural occupation. These are large areas deforested for agricultural production,” explains Luis Fernando Guedes Pinto, scientific director of the SOS Mata Atlântica Foundation, in charge of the report.
According to him, this year’s Atlas also draws attention to the worsening of the situation in states that were nearing zero deforestation – when it does not exceed 100 hectares. This is the case of São Paulo, which jumped from 43 to 218 hectares deforested between 2019 and 2020, a 402% surge.
Espírito Santo and Rio de Janeiro also saw significant increases, of 462% and 106%, respectively, but still remain within what is considered zero deforestation, alongside 6 other states.
According to Pinto, unlike what happens in the regions with the highest rate of devastation, the main cause of deforestation in these places is not agriculture and cattle-raising, but rather real estate development.
“In São Paulo, for example, the main pressure is around the metropolitan regions. There are several small deforested areas around springs, big cities and the coast for real estate and tourism development,” he says.
The Atlantic Forest is the biome that spreads over the most Brazilian states: 17 in total. However, because it is predominantly located in the coastal region, where the majority of the population lives, it is also the most devastated.
Currently, only 12.4% of its original cover remains, well below the minimum limit for its conservation, estimated at 30% by an article published in Science magazine. Below this level, the biome suffers self-degradation, reducing its capacity to provide ecosystem services such as water supply and pollination of species.
For Pinto, Brazil has enough legislation in place to restrict deforestation in the Atlantic Forest, but it has yet to be adequately enforced. “The main problem is the lack of governance and enforcement. The difficulty in enforcing not only the Forest Code, but the Atlantic Forest Law, which does not allow the conversion of advanced forest areas. Deforestation should be a very occasional thing, but it isn’t.”
The director recalls that in April 2020, Environment Minister Ricardo Salles signed an order granting amnesty to landowners who destroyed sensitive areas of the Atlantic Forest. The intention was to enforce the Forest Code, which pardons deforestation done until 2008, to the detriment of the specific law about the biome. However, the Minister reversed the decision after the Federal Prosecutor’s Office (MPF) lodged a public civil suit requesting its annulment.
“These signals that the federal government is giving that they can deforest have consequences. There is an attack on the Atlantic Forest Law and this can indeed have an impact on producers and entrepreneurs, who deforest expecting impunity,” says Pinto.
Despite being the most devastated biome in Brazil, the Atlantic Forest is home to over 20,000 species of plants, including the world’s largest diversity of trees per hectare, and 1,300 animal species.
An article published in Nature magazine in October 2020 showed that it is exactly this rich biodiversity that makes the forest one of the highest priority global biomes for environmental restoration.
The study, led by Brazilian researcher and director of the International Institute for Sustainability (ISS), Bernardo Strassburg, used an algorithm that calculates which areas and ecosystems are priorities for recovery according to the goal to be achieved.
Stipulating the goal of preserving biodiversity and absorbing carbon from the atmosphere, the Atlantic Forest is among the biomes whose restoration would have the greatest impact on the world.
The article estimated that in this group, the recovery of 15% of the deforested area would be enough to prevent the extinction of 60% of endangered species on the planet and absorb 30% of carbon accumulated in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution.
“The Atlantic forest has already lost almost all of its original area, so restoring it has a much greater impact compared to a more intact ecosystem,” says Strassburg.
The researcher also emphasizes the need to prioritize areas for recovery within the forest itself, since most of its remnants are scattered across Brazil and in fragments that are often smaller than 50 hectares.
“If instead of dispersing restoration on each property, we do it in an intelligent way, creating corridors that connect the remnants, we can increase the cost-benefit of restoration by 8 times. That is, it is not a little better, it is extraordinarily better,” he says.
For Luis Fernando Guedes Pinto, from the SOS Mata Atlântica Foundation, there is no doubt that restoration is the most pressing issue for the biome today.
According to him, a good part of this agenda can be accomplished by simply applying the Forest Code. Starting with the recovery of Permanent Preservation Areas (APP).
“These are areas of low agricultural productivity, but of high ecological fragility. The first major action is to remove whatever is there – grass, sugar cane, coffee – and bring back the forest, either by natural regeneration or by planting seedlings,” he explains.
In addition, the director cites projects such as PlanaVeg (National Plan for Recovery of Native Vegetation), which aims to restore 12 million hectares in the country, and the Atlantic Forest Pact, which established the goal of recovering 15 million hectares by 2050.
For Pinto, restoring the biome is a commitment not only to mitigate the climate emergency, but to a significant portion of the population that relies on its ecosystem services.
Today, 145 million people are within the boundaries of the Atlantic forest, as well as 80% of the national economy and a fraction of Brazil’s food production.
“Some of these ecosystem services are showing signs of stress due to the compromised vegetation, as shown by the recent water crises in São Paulo and Paraná.”
Currently, the reservoirs of hydroelectric plants in the Southeast and Midwest regions are at their lowest level since 2015, due to the worst drought in 20 years in the period between November and late March, which is traditionally rainy.
Both the director and researcher Bernardo Strassburg agree that the environmental recovery of the Atlantic Forest should not be achieved by sacrificing the conservation of its remnants.
This is because the increase in vegetation cover may not provide the desired environmental benefits if, at the same time, there is a loss of older areas, as shown in another study published in Science magazine.
According to the article, old forests are irreplaceable for biodiversity conservation, as many species of animals, plants and microorganisms are unable to recolonize younger areas, depending on less altered and more structurally developed habitats to survive.
In other words, unless the native vegetation cover is preserved, forest rejuvenation can have negative impacts on the conservation of biodiversity.
Pinto says that this is one of the main concerns raised by the numbers in this year’s Atlantic Forest Atlas.
“We lost 13,000 hectares of mature forests, which is where the big jequitibas, the big cedars, the ipês are. It is a lot. Moreover, even if the same 13,000 hectares are replanted today, they will only have the ecological value we lost in 100 years.”