Innovative Public Policies
Innovative public policies for the conservation and restoration of privately owned farms in the Matopiba region
PATHWAYS
pathways
START
January 2021
DURATION
17 months
BIOME
Cerrado
LOCATION
Matopiba, Brazil
STATUS
Concluded
The objective of this initiative was to support the restoration and conservation of native vegetation on soy farms in the Matopiba region—the region between the Brazilian states of Maranhão, Tocantins, Piaui and Bahia—through public policies at the State level. Among other activities, Agroicone published the report “An Overview of Ecological Restoration in Matopiba and Public Policy Benchmarking” (linked here) that outlined possible paths for large-scale restoration in the Cerrado, pointed out the main challenges and opportunities for the dissemination of the practice in the region, and presented an unprecedented benchmarking of 58 successful restoration-related policies and initiatives in 15 States across Brazil and the Federal District. The report identified the following bottlenecks: lack of knowledge and technical expertise on ecological restoration specifically tailored to the needs of the Cerrado; insufficient monitoring mechanisms; lack of funding for restoration; absence of regulations for public policies such as the Environmental Regularization Program (PRA) and other financial incentives; and difficulties for the analysis and validation of the Rural Environmental Registry (CAR).
“Ecological restoration in Matopiba is still incipient, with few practical experiences and projects. State governments are more focused on regulations, activities to combat deforestation and Rural Environmental Registry (CAR). The project mapped successful policies in several states with a deeper understanding of opportunities to adapt these policies in Matopiba states, in addition to regulatory improvement needs. We’re now able to design the roadmap to concretize actions to support environmental regularizations of soy farms in the region.” - Laura Antoniazzi, project coordinator and partner at Agroicone.
The grant activity culminated successfully in 2022 and resulted in the design of 3 draft public policies proposals in the States of Maranhão, Tocantins, and Bahia, including a draft ordinance which includes a revision of the State of Bahia’s restoration guidelines and the development of updated terms of reference for restoration projects in the State of Bahia, in partnership with the State Environment Secretariat (SEMA) and the Institute of Environment and Water Resources (INEMA), which will serve as a technical reference for the region and potentially the country. LIF is currently exploring options with Agroicone to conduct post-project monitoring of the conservation and restoration policy proposals developed under their project in the MATOPIBA region.
Read the complete study.
