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Presidential Message from Mark Tercek of The Nature Conservancy

Mission of The Nature Conservancy

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Non-profit Governance and Leadership of The Nature Conservancy

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Protecting the Atlantic Forest

Only 7 percent of Brazil's critically endangered Atlantic Forest remains intact. The Nature Conservancy is cooperating with in-country partners to protect the largest remaining remnant of this forest type by bolstering protection of public lands, establishing private reserves, and assisting in targeted community development. Guaraqueçaba is Brazil's first Parks in Peril site, as well as the first site in Brazil where carbon sequestration will be used to finance forest protection and regeneration.

Sites: Guaraqueçaba Environmental Protection Area Morro da Mina

Partners: SPVS and Fundação O Boticário

Basic Facts:

  • The Coastal and Interior Atlantic Forest once stretched from Brazil's southern border to its northeast corner. Today, only 7 percent of the forest remains intact.
  • What remains of the forest is extraordinarily rich in species and exhibits a high degree of endemism. It is globally outstanding in biological distinctiveness and is critically endangered.
  • The Guaraqueçaba Environmental Protection Area, located on the coast of the southern state of Paraná, is the largest remaining remnant of Coastal Atlantic Forest in Brazil.
  • The protected area covers 313,000 hectares (774,000 acres) of mangroves, coastal Restinga woodlands, estuaries and tropical rainforests stretching from the coastal plain to the 1,500-meter (5,000 feet) high summits of the Serra do Mar mountain range.
  • Guaraqueçaba encompasses mostly private lands and small communities, but also includes a national park, protected mangrove forests, two island refuges for endangered parrots, and two private nature reserves.
  • SPVS, the Society for Wildlife Research & Environmental Education, has been the foremost non-governmental organization on a wide range of scientific research, conservation, education and community development activities in the Guaraqueçaba area since the mid-1980s. SPVS also manages the 4,600-acre Morro da Mina private nature reserve adjacent to Guaraqueçaba.
  • Fundação O Boticário has been a leader in private land management and corporate involvement in conservation in Brazil, and manages the 4,300-acre Salto de Morato Reserve inside Guaraqueçaba.

Conservation Threats:

  • Buffalo ranching, introduced when a road penetrated the region in the 1970's, has caused extensive forest clearing for pastures.
  • Unsustainable extractive activities such as logging, heart-of-palm gathering, overfishing, and hunting are systematically eroding the resource base of Guaraqueçaba's rich forests.
  • Highway improvements, anticipated in the near future, risk bringing uncontrolled tourism and recreational development.
  • Brazil's most intense population and development pressures: Elsewhere in Brazil, Atlantic Forest remnants are located near the wealthiest, most industrialized and most populous portions of the country, and are threatened by booming urbanization, industrialization, recreational development, and agriculture.

Activities and Achievements:

  • Acquisition, in concert with our partner organizations, of nearly 4,000 hectares (10,000 acres) of land for private preserves.
  • Development of a carbon-sequestration project that has financed forest protection and recuperation and the creation of a private reserve on 7,000 more hectares (17,000 acres) of land previously being used for buffalo ranching.
  • Cooperation with key local communities to provide potable water, health, and education services.
  • Establishment of a protection program for the endangered red-tailed parrot.
  • Initiation of the first Parks in Peril program in Brazil, providing funding for the consolidation of the official protected area at Guaraqueçaba.

Challenges and Future Plans:

  • Rescue and protect intact Atlantic Forest ecosystems in Guaraqueçaba and elsewhere.
  • Build the capacity of Brazilian organizations, both public and private, to manage and defend these lands in perpetuity.
  • Strengthen the participation of all stakeholders, from multinational corporations to local communities, in the protection of these forests.
  • Channel the necessary human, technical and financial resources to make these conservation programs succeed.

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