Deforestation of Atlantic Forest in First Semester Higher Than in 2019

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The deforestation of the Atlantic Forest in the first six months of 2020 is now higher than in the whole of last year.

Illegal logging occurred in a preservation area in Santa Helena, interior of Paraná. The police arrested two people.

The deforestation of the Atlantic Forest in the first half of 2020 is already higher than in 2019. It is over 12,000 hectares, the equivalent of three Tijuca Parks in Rio.

Paraná is the state recording the highest deforestation of Atlantic Forest in Brazil’s South Region and is third overall in the country, behind Bahia and Minas Gerais.

The ‘Jornal Nacional’ team followed the environmental police during an inspection of a rural area in the metropolitan region of Curitiba. “We’re going to head out to the farm’s exit to check on the situation,” the sergeant says on audio.

The forest should reach up to 30 meters from the river, in an environmental preservation area. But every time the area is cleared for planting, the trees are uprooted to make room for the plantation.

“Over time, people have been uprooting the edges and entering the environmental preservation area, which is what’s happening here,” explains Ernesto Steiner dos Santos, an environmental police sergeant.

The owner of the area will be fined R$5,000. In six months, Paraná has imposed close to R$16 million in fines for deforestation.

To reach the sites, the police rely on satellite imagery analyzed by MapBiomas, an organization that includes NGOs, universities and technology companies. Even small deforested areas are captured by high-resolution images.

“Now we can see all kinds of deforestation and produce evidence consistent with the before and after images, which will be very valuable in court. Our goal is to ensure that anyone who deforests illegally no longer has this sense of impunity,” explains Marcos Rosa, of MapBiomas.

In Brazil, only 12 percent of the original Atlantic Forest remains preserved. According to the environmental police, illegal logging is mainly done for agriculture and for real estate projects in areas near the cities. “The forest is being monitored. This is of great value with respect to environmental inspection”, says Ernesto Steiner.

Source: G1