Abstract

LIMA, Rogério B. de; LIMA, Sabrina M. B. S. B. de; CALVI, Miquéias F.  and  MORAIS, Vinicius A.. Loss of vegetation and Public Policies: Study of an Agrarian Reform Settlement Area in the Southern Amazon. Rev. de Ciências Agrárias [online]. 2020, vol.43, n.2, pp.169-188.  Epub May 12, 2020. ISSN 0871-018X.  https://doi.org/10.19084/rca.19992.

Agrarian reform beneficiary families, who are allocated to a new settlement project, face difficulties on subsistence. Despite of its social and economic importance, the creation of settlements has become a point of discussion, as one of the main responsible for Amazon’s deforestation. This research aimed to quantify and evaluate deforestation in settlement project São Pedro, municipality of Paranaíta, State of Mato Grosso, Brazil, in the interval of 22 years, to understand the extent to which agrarian reform policy is related to the growth of deforestation. The study of the evolution of deforestation was based on comparative analyzes through thematic maps of the years from 1997 to 2018, elaborated using remote sensing. In the creation year, the area consisted of 91.51% of vegetation and only 8.49% of deforested areas. In 2018, the situation was the opposite, 82.73% of the total area was deforested, which is equivalent to 28,869.58 acre, with an average of 1,312.25 acre/year. The highest rates of deforestation were seen in years of release and application of agricultural credit from Pronaf resources, what allow concluding that the absence or insufficiency of national agricultural policy measures aimed at settled families of agrarian reform has a direct impact on deforestation rates.

Keywords : Deforestation; Brazilian Amazon; Livestock; Social development.

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