Brazilian Amazon Rosewood Conservation Project

The project has been implemented to prevent unplanned deforestation in native forests by monitoring and conserving nearly 180,000 hectares in 17 privately owned parcels or “Glebas” in the Portel, a micro-region of Brazil. It intends to prevent emissions of 550,000 tonnes every year and 22 million tonnes of CO2 over a 40-year period through improved forest management.

It is managed in the form of a “private conservation reserve” through the development and deployment of a management plan. The plan includes comprehensive monitoring and enforcement built on the existing experience of ongoing surveillance activities in the area, which began in 2008. The medium-term goal is to allow maximum forest regeneration in order to increase the amount of carbon sequestered in the forest.

Since 2008, the Project has been very successful in creating legal documentation to demonstrate clear land title and land tenure. By patrolling the area, it has also identified and reduced illegal activities such as logging, squatting and attempts to create pastures for livestock. It provides alternative sources of income and training in sustainable farming and cattle raising.

The project area is characterized by forests rich in valuable timber species, illegal logging, unclear land tenure laws, widespread land speculation, overall weak law enforcement and severe poverty. The main way to access the reserve is by river via public and private transport 20 hours from the nearest city although new roads are being constructed all the time.

The local population is comprised mainly of settlers known as “Ribeirinhos”, who live along the rivers and along the igarapés (small streams). Economic activities in the area are subsistence timber extraction and sale, subsistence agriculture and fishing.

Stable, long term community activities are designed to transform local economies over the life of the Project. Thus, the focus of the RMDLT is to secure land tenure, develop local business and income-generating activities. Project activities focus on education, sustainable agriculture, community-based ecotourism and sustainable management of natural resources. These activities will reduce the necessity of community members to deforest and degrade the Project Area.

• Today I feel important thanks to your project (RMDLT). We do not think anyone knows we’re here in the woods. The project helps us save the forest that is the home of the river people, and helps us to have a better life, now I have my land, a document with my name, I feel happy. – Valdemir Cordeiro Da Costa – 5 family members.
• Despite this quiet here, we lived in fear because of illegal loggers. Many threatened us to cut wood here. With the project, came the patrols to stop the cutting, after that everything got much better. Nobody else disturbs or threatens us. – Aldenora Da Costa Do Carmo – 11 family members
• I am a hard worker, but the opportunities never arrived here, we live far from everything. I like everything that the project has brought to us, but especially the security of living and planting in a place that is mine, that will be my children’s. – Ana Celia De Oliveira Braga – 10 family members.

This project addresses a very unique, yet widespread problem of illegal land acquisition and the systemic clearing of forests, prevalent in the Brazilian Amazon. The integrated management system of forests and lands adopted by this project ensures the sustainability and recovery of indigenous reserves while mitigating threats to conservation. It can also serve as a model to be replicated easily across several other municipalities.