The cerrado is the most threatened of the major biomes in the Brazilian territory. And a particularly vulnerable part are its wetlands, which guarantee the existence of perennial rivers and supply no less than eight hydrographic basins.
The Xingu, Tocantins, Araguaia, São Francisco, Parnaíba, Jequitinhonha, Paraná and Paraguay, among other important rivers, originate in the cerrado.
The destruction of wetlands is not just a threat to biodiversity and the extraordinary beauty of Cerratan landscapes. It also jeopardizes the country’s water and energy security.
Furthermore, wetlands are an extraordinary repository of carbon (C), storing over 200 tons per hectare. And changes in its cyclical balance tend to release methane (CH4) into the atmosphere, one of the main greenhouse gases (GHG).
The problem is that the very definition of wetlands is confusing. And this confusion has been exploited by large rural producers who, not content with wildly converting dry areas of the cerrado into arable land, are also considering draining the wetlands, in order to extend soybean crops to the bottom of the paths.
If it weren’t for other reasons, even from the strict point of view of economic interest, this would be equivalent to lifting a stone to let it fall on its own feet, since the possibility of irrigation depends on the survival of the water sources.
To resolve the confusion and provide decision makers with solid scientific criteria, a group of researchers has just produced an article covering the multiple ecosystems encompassed by the concept of wetlands. This is Cerrado wetlands: multiple ecosystems deserving legal protection as a unique and irreplaceable treasure, published in the journal Perspectives in Ecology and Conservation.
“The lack of precise definitions has confused regulations, leaving important segments of the cerrado unprotected. Our objective was to clarify what wetlands are; which ecosystems can be encompassed by that name; what dynamics they present; and what we must do to protect them. los”, researcher Giselda Durigan, first author of the article, tells Agência FAPESP.
Durigan is a researcher at the IPA (Environmental Research Institute) in the State of São Paulo and professor in the graduate programs at Unesp (São Paulo State University) and Unicamp (State University of Campinas). She has been studying the cerrado for over 35 years.
“An example of the serious risk that the lack of precise definitions and ambiguities in the interpretation of the law can entail was Resolution number 45, of August 31, 2022, approved by Consema [Conselho do Meio Ambiente de Mato Grosso]🇧🇷 Disrespecting the decision of the SJT [Superior Tribunal de Justiça], this norm regulated the ‘environmental licensing of activities and undertakings located in wetlands’ at the state level. Behind the euphemisms of the text, the resolution, in fact, unleashes destruction”, denounces Durigan.
The researcher defines: “Wetlands are portions of continental land that are subject, periodically or permanently, to waterlogging or flooding. Given their fragility and extreme importance for storing and filtering water, they are globally protected, since the convention intergovernmental event held in Ramsar, Iran, in 1971. Brazil has been a signatory to the Ramsar convention since 1996, but until today it has not complied with the commitment to map all its wetlands”.
In the country, there are examples of wetlands in coastal strips, where flood pulses result from tidal oscillations, so that the water is salty or brackish. And also far from the coast, composing two large types, hydrologically distinct: lands that are periodically flooded by the overflow of river beds (floodplains and swamps) and lands that are soaked or even flooded by the periodic rise of the water table.
“The humid areas of the cerrado generally fall into the latter type. The abundant rains, which fall in the summer months, infiltrate slowly and deeply into the soil, recharging the water table and accumulating in the humid areas, from which the small creeks that never run dry and feed the great rivers of Brazil, even in the dry season. Unlike, in fact, the other great savannahs in the world, whose great rivers dry up at all during a good part of the year”, informs Durigan.
comprehensive protection
According to the researcher, the confusion that shuffles the regulation is due to the fact that, within the humid areas of the cerrado, there are different types of vegetation, which result in multiple regional denominations. They are humid fields, murundus fields, peatlands, paths, palm groves, buritizais, gallery forests, swamp forests and so on. Sometimes, in a single wetland, there are two or more types of vegetation, from clear fields to dense forests, which has made understanding, delimitation and protection difficult.
“The law sometimes refers to only one of the types, as is the case with the paths in the Law for the Protection of Native Vegetation [12.651], from 2012, leaving the other types unprotected. At other times, the law only protects a part of the wetland, leaving entire stretches without legal coverage”, points out Durigan.
She says that the article in question resulted from a multidisciplinary effort, involving specialists in vegetation, hydrology, ecophysiology, conservation, restoration and environmental legislation, who used their knowledge and practical experiences to unify and disseminate their understanding on the subject. The group received support from FAPESP through three projects (19/07773-1, 20/09257-8 and 20/01378-0).
“For us, all wetlands must be equally and fully protected by law, ensuring that they are not converted to cultivation and that their natural pulses of waterlogging or flooding are not affected by the use of the surrounding land. such as beekeeping and extractivism, for example, can be admitted, but they need to be validated and regulated”, emphasizes Durigan.
And its emphasis is justified, as the threats to wetlands are many in the cerrado, highlighting the damming of streams, drainage of swampy lands, expansion of urbanized areas, infrastructure works, uncontrolled extraction of water from wells for irrigation and tree planting. , mainly eucalyptus, in entire hydrographic basins, where the original vegetation was not forest.
“All these activities have a high impact. They reduce the water table level or may even deplete it locally, putting water security and ecosystem services in the cerrado at risk. It is something that needs to be urgently prevented through competent legislation and the effective application of the law”, says the researcher.
Durigan comments that the Law for the Protection of Native Vegetation treats wetlands in a very confusing manner, leaving part of them as APPs (Permanent Preservation Areas) and another part as AURs (Restricted Use Areas). But that some types of cerrado wetlands do not fit the definitions of the types mentioned, which has generated imprecision in law enforcement, with legal, social and political conflicts.
“In an attempt to pacify the situation, the STJ [Superior Tribunal de Justiça] decided that, given their unquestionable environmental importance, all wetlands should be understood as protected, whether as APPs or AURs, regardless of nomenclature. It was this decision that the resolution of the Consema of the State of Mato Grosso disrespected”, underlines the researcher.
The good news is that there is, at the moment, a large group of technicians and scientists, representing different regions of Brazil, committed to carrying out the National Wetland Inventory, under the leadership of specialists Wolfgang Junk and Cátia Nunes da Cunha, from the INCT Wetlands (Inau), to provide support to the Ministry of the Environment.
“The MapBiomas Platform recently included the caption ‘Áreas Humid’ on its maps, which constitutes a great advance. However, demarcating wet areas in the field, on the scale of a rural property, is not an easy task and this hinders the application Our article proposes objective criteria, based on hydromorphic soil, endemic flora and the maximum elevation of the water table to facilitate the delimitation of wetlands on a local scale”, concludes Durigan.
The article Cerrado wetlands: multiple ecosystems deserving legal protection as a unique and irreplaceable treasure can be accessed here.
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