Roads, deforestation and the mitigating effect of the Chico Mendes extractive reserve in the southwestern Amazon

• Main Authors: Brown, I.F (Author), Milien, E.J (Author), Perz, S.G (Author), Rocha, K.D.S (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V. 2021
• Subjects: Amazon; Amazonia; biodiversity; Conservation; deforestation; Deforestation; ecosystem service; forest cover; nature conservation; protected area; Protected areas; remote sensing; Remote sensing; road; Roads
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher

 Implementation of protected areas is a good strategy to reduce deforestation. Reducing forest cover loss is critical to climate change mitigation, especially in the Amazon. Various types of protected areas have been established to conserve biodiversity and reduce forest cover loss. Deforestation in the Amazon is mostly caused by highway paving. This raises questions about the effectiveness of the Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve (CMER), a conservation unit near the BR-317 highway. This study therefore evaluates the effectiveness of the CMER to reduce deforestation. We constructed 6 buffers, with 3 outside the CMER and 3 within the reserve. In 2000, forest cover was 97% inside the reserve and 78% outside. By 2018, deforestation increased 44% outside but only 14% inside the CMER. Consequently, in 2018 there was 34% of forest cover remaining outside with 84% inside. A Wilcoxon test shows statistically significant differences between losses inside and outside the CMER (p<0.05). These findings show that the CMER makes a significant difference in conserving forest cover in the presence of a paved highway. Even with infrastructure, protected areas continue to conserve ecosystem services and biodiversity by reducing forest cover loss. © 2020 The Author(s)