Conserving the Amazon: map, manage, protect A conservation strategy Summary The Strategy ................................page 03 Context .......................................page 04 Map, Manage, Protect: A Summary .................................page 09 Map ............................................page 10 Manage ......................................page 11 Protect ........................................page 13 ACT’s Publication Series: Map, Manage, Protect ................page 14 © ACT Brazil Editions Reproduction of this publication is permitted when the source is referenced 2nd edition. Printing: 500 exemplares Publication of this edition: May 2008 ACT Brazil President Vasco van Roosmalen Vice President Almir Narayamoga Surui Publication and editorial project Ana Carolina Kalume Maranhão Drafting and graphic production Masanori Ohashy - Idade da Pedra Diagramming Alexandre Lemos (Intern) Idade da Pedra Review and translation: David Stone and Renata Carvalho Giglio de Oliveira Photograph ACT Brazil´s files © Bento Viana/ Oikos Image Agency/ ACT Brasil Editions © Fernando Bizerra/ BG Press / ACT Brasil Editions The Strategy Based on successful bio-cultural conservation experiences and relationships in the field, ACT and its partners have designed a multi-year, 140 million acre rainforest conservation strategy along three regional axes in the Amazon basin and based on a three-step approach: Map, Manage, Protect. This innovative and effective conservation strategy focuses on the need to increase indigenous and local capacity to manage and protect the Amazon’s remaining rainforests while also addressing the urgent survival needs and well-being of indigenous communities. Amazon Conservation Team’s area of expertise Parque Nacional Terra indígena Uru-Ueu-Wau-Wau Resguardo Cozumbe das Montanhas do Tumucumaque Terra indígena Zoró Resguardo Niñeras Terra indígena 7 de Setembro Terra indígena Kwamalasamutu Resguardo São Miguel Terra indígena Igarapé Lourdes Terra indígena Tepu Resguardo de San Marcelino Terra indígena Médio Rio Negro II Terra indígena Wajana Resguardo y Cabildo Inga-Camza Terra indígena Nhamundá-Mapuera Assatrizy Resguardo y Cabildo Inganos del Cauca Terra indígena Parque do Tumucumaque Cabildo Inga-Camza Resguardos e Cacijagos Coregajes Terra indígena Parque do Xingu Resquardo del Caquetá Terra indígena Trombetas Mapuera Resguardo Buena Vista América do Sul Context The Area The Amazon basin is characterized by a large network of river systems flowing through the world’s largest extent of tropical rainforests. Covering territories in nine different countries in South America, the rainforest is assailed by deforestation on a great number of fronts driven by mega infrastructure projects and large-scale conversion to crop and cattle lands. Its most pristine territories are located in the remote border regions of the Amazonian countries and those places where indigenous peoples still make up a large part of the forest’s inhabitants. In the zones of destruction, indigenous lands make up a majority of the areas still forested and protected. ACT and its partners intend to work along three important axes of standing rainforests where ACT already has a strong presence and relationship with local communities: The northeast Amazon including French Guiana, Suriname, Guyana and northeastern Brazil; The northwest Amazon including Colombia and Brazil; The central Amazon along the Brazilian Amazon states of Rondônia, Mato Grosso and Amazonas. The Actors Indigenous communities are the main actors within this unique conservation strategy, involving government, NGOs and local communities. These Indians inhabit, intimately know and manage large swaths of rainforest including crucial headwaters and high biodiversity areas. Today, indigenous chiefs, shamans, institutional representatives, men, women, young and old are working for the protection of their forests and the well-being of their communities. ACT, its staff and its partners have longstanding relationships with the indigenous communities with whom they work and extensive experience in the implementation of community-led programs. Facts Over 20% of the Brazilian Amazon has been demarcated as indigenous territories; Over 50% of Suriname rainforests have been mapped and are used by indigenous peoples; Indigenous peoples are the main conservation actors in the some of the world’s most remote forests; Indigenous communities have mapped 50 million acres of previously unknown forest regions in great detail; Indigenous lands are often the last remaining forested lands in the arc of deforestation. The Steps Toward Destruction History has shown that the destruction and conversion of forests move more quickly than the ability to turn forests into protected areas. Logging and mining operations arrive first with the first roads constructed or even where there are no roads in the case of mining. These inroads are soon followed by frontier farmers and principally cattle ranchers. The continued improvement of roads and infrastructure then allow the implementation of large-scale monocultures such as soybeans, cotton and rice. Indigenous peoples living in these regions are over- run, co-opted or become the last defenders of the last remains of forests. Cultures, livelihoods and communities are all decimated and with them, their forests. The threats and conditions that force indigenous communities to make life-changing choices for themselves, their children and their forests are imposed from one day to the next without providing these peoples with a clear understanding of what these conditions will mean for the future. The Consequences The global public – especially the inhabitants of the Amazon region – are beginning to see the consequences of this unbridled expansion of deforestation. Environmental degradation, erosion, drought, poverty and social upheaval are all part of the reality of the Amazon region today. Indigenous and local conservation leaders live under threat but receive only limited assistance in their struggle. Indigenous communities in areas that already have gone through full conversion to cropland have lost their lands and forests and depend on government handouts and day labor jobs for their continued survival. In Brazil, over 200 indigenous languages and their communities have gone extinct and, with them, more than 10% of the Brazilian rainforest (an area the size of France) has already disappeared without hope of return. Map, Manage, Protect: A Summary One does not transform a standing forest into an effectively-safeguarded protected area overnight. Nor can one expect an indigenous community to transform itself into a protection force of its traditional territories from one day to the next in the face of ever-increasing pressure from the outside. These transformations require a concerted effort with clearly outlined strategies and goals. 10 Map ACT’s experience has repeatedly demonstrated that any strategy seeking to provide real protection to traditional lands must begin with the generation of a detailed area map. ACT and its partners have developed and implemented a number of different methodologies to work with indigenous communities to map their traditional territories and evaluate both challenges and opportunities. These tools include cultural and land use maps, risk maps, ethno-environmental surveys, remote monitoring and local capacity-maps. Why map? Secure indigenous land rights; Goal Create a foundation for ACT will work with its partners in mapping 140 million sustainable management of acres of indigenous rainforest lands by 2012. territories; Create a foundation for Facts real and effective protection Through 2006, ACT and its partners have trained over of forests; 150 indigenous cartographers and helped 20 ethnic Identify and diagnose groups map: threats; Identify and implement 50 million acres of rainforests; solutions; 8.000 indigenous place names; To legally create and or 120 indigenous villages; expand protected areas. Hundreds of sites of cultural and historic importance; Thousands of sites of traditional resource use. 11 Manage Any strategy that contemplates the preservation of the Amazon’s forests needs to identify means to ensure their proper management with real benefits for those performing that management, whether this involves economically and ecologically sustainable extraction activities or a more hands-off, pure protectionist approach. Together with the Why Manage? maps produced, communities can Provide basic incomes for communities in a sustainable sit down and discuss internally manner, ensuring the protection of their forests and how to best move forward as biodiversity values; well as how to negotiate with Get ahead of uncontrolled and destructive extractive potential partners and explore activities and create real incentives for protection; sustainable ways to ensure income Because the inhabitants of these forests are the ones generation for the community who know and understand these forests and have the while maintaining and protecting greatest stake in their fate; their forests and traditions. Allow the protectors of the forest to live according to Management also involves the their culture and effectively deal with the changes wrought sustainable use of scarce biological by contact with the outside world. resources, flora and fauna as well as proper management of traditional knowledge systems. ACT specializes in the implementation of programs Goal that focus on the strengthening ACT will collaborate with indigenous communities