Inspection increases presence in the Amazon, but impunity for environmental crime remains the same [21/11/2006 16:45]

At the same time as the government broadens operations for environmental repression in the Amazon region, as well as the resources geared towards them, coordinated action between different agencies such as IBAMA (Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources  - Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e dos Recursos Naturais Renováveis) and the Federal Police (FP) is actually taking place. However, punishment of criminals is insufficient and the average effective charging and payment of environmental fines is very low throughout the Amazon region, creating a sense of impunity.

In close to four years, and if compared to previous years, Lula's administration has broadened inspection operations in the Amazon region and the resources allocated to them. The figures featured by the Ministry of the Environment (MMA) and the National Institute of Space Research (Inpe) seem to confirm that the impact of the Deforestation Prevention and Control Plan in the Amazon has been felt in the two successive declines in deforestation rates between 2004 and 2006. One of the reasons for the State’s greater presence in the region was the investment made on the satellite forest monitoring system, featuring agile display of deforestation data. Also effective was the coordinated action of different agencies such as IBAMA (Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources - Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e dos Recursos Naturais Renováveis) and the Federal Police (FP).

The greatest difficulty found by the repression of environmental crime, however, remains the punishment of the offender. The average charging and payment of environmental fines in the Amazon region remains very low. There isn’t concrete and updated data, but it is common knowledge that less than 10% of the fines are paid. Furthermore, in most cases, illegal deforestation is forbidden, but the area is still being used by those who carried it out. All in all, the equipment used in the activity is also not seized. Impunity stimulates new deforestation acts and reduces the impact of the work of IBAMA’s inspection officials. 

In addition to the inspection, other policies put to practice thanks to the plan have influenced the slow-down in deforestation in the past two years: the creation of over 19.5 million acres of federal Protected Areas (PAs), the institution of moralising land norms and the temporary prohibition of activities with environmental impact on millions of acres along the highways BR-163 (Cuiabá-Santarém), in Pará, and BR-319 (Manaus-Porto Velho), in Amazonas. It is also clear that the recession lived by the agribusiness since 2004 has had its influence on the decline of deforestation rates.  

Nevertheless, the absence of consistent indices for each of these initiatives and on the economic situation, which might influence the deforestation dynamics, still prevents a deeper assessment of the government’s environmental policies and questions the maintenance of the downward trend on the pace of deforestation. IBAMA has been gathering and analysing the figures regarding its actions, but has so far been incapable of presenting society with detailed data. The shifting and sophistication of deforestation fronts make it clear that the government must further advance its scope, not only in terms of command and control, but also in the consolidation of the PAs and in the fostering of a sustainable economy.  

Impunity remains the rule 

One of the good results presented by the Lula administration regards infraction actions and the value of the fines applied for damage performed on the vegetation of the Legal Amazon. With partial results until October, the present administration has an average of 5.7 thousand infraction actions per year against 4.6 thousand of the second President Fernando Henrique administration, according to IBAMA data. In August 2005, a decree raised the value of the fine per acre illegally deforested from R$1 thousand to R$5 thousand. Until October this year, IBAMA had reached R$ 2.8 billion fines for illegal deforestation throughout the Amazon region. We have required information on the amount actually paid, but until closing of this piece, we hadn’t received that information. 

This sizeable value might indicate that the environmental agency has turned into a great resource collector for the federal government, but that is not the case. IBAMA does not supply exact numbers, but we do know that the effective charging of infractions is extremely low around the Amazon. This generates a reality of generalised impunity, which not only does not constrain those who deforest illegally, but even fosters such actions. 

In Mato Grosso, a state featuring a model monitoring and licensing system, only 2% of the fines are paid. The study titled Environmental Licensing System in Rural Properties in the State of Mato Grosso: analysis of lessons of its implementation, drafted by ISA last year and commissioned by the Ministry of Environment, pointed among other things that a large percentage of environmental fines applied in the state is either cancelled or have their value reduced. Besides, the suit of offenders is rather longwinded, and may go on for as long as four or five years. According to the study, because the area irregularly deforested is not closed, the process’ slowness and inefficiency end up benefiting the violator because he may go on making a profit from the activities he develops on the land. Read more. 

Operations bases 

One of the novelties brought about by the Lula administration’s Action Plan to Prevent Deforestation was the construction, starting in 2004, of 19 operations bases in strategic locations of the Deforestation Arch, particularly in the states of Mato Grosso and Pará. These facilities usually feature a small number of IBAMA’s inspection teams and police officers, and one or two vehicles, a computer and Internet access to receive the deforestation maps. In some more important cities and operations, however, they feature a larger team with technicians from Incra, soldiers, military and federal police officers. According to IBAMA, 15 bases are in operation, being used both for routine inspection and large joint police operations to break up gangs that perform landgrabs and illegal exploration and sale of wood. In eight operations carried out in Mato Grosso this year, approximately 50 people were brought in among IBAMA environmental analysts, Federal Police and technicians from support agencies. 

Inpe’s numbers confirm that the deforestation pace has declined largely in the areas covered by the bases, as they include whole towns or parts of them. Out of 19 of them, which were in operation until 2005, 17 have seen a decline in deforestation rates between 2003 and 2005, with a highlight to Juína (- 96,5%) and Sinop (- 95,7%), in Mato Grosso, and Marabá (PA), with - 93,7%. 

ISA, in a partnership with the Centro de Vida Institute, is drafting a report for the Mato Grosso Forest Management Evaluation and Monitoring Committee, an agency linked to the state’s Environment Secretariat, proposing an inspection index that reflects the two agencies’ efforts (together or separately) in fighting deforestation in the state. This study should be finished and presented to the Secretary of the Environment and to Conama early next week. 

Deforestation data per operations base from Prodes

IBAMA’s director of Environmental Protection, Mr. Flávio Montiel, confirms that the agency is still working on methodologies in order to assess the impact of inspection on the decline of deforestation rates, but they know beyond any doubt that the government’s actions have been of vital importance. “We can’t prove (that inspection and investigation reduced deforestation) and there is no point in proving it. It might be more interesting to ask the opposite question: what makes us believe that it was the inspection and not other factors?” Repeating the government’s discourse, Montiel believes that the crisis lived by the agricultural and cattle-raising sectors in the last two years would suffice to stop the cutting of the trees. He believes that the investments on equipment and personnel, planning and intelligence have been responsible for IBAMA’s greater presence in the Amazon. “What we did was more than avoiding the destruction of trees or the forest, but also deterring a complex process, breaking up organised gangs that involved even part of IBAMA”.

In May 2005, a considerable part of the resources allotted to the Action Plan to Prevent Deforestation hadn’t been liberated by the government in 2004. Out of the 64 inspection operations planned for that year, only ten had been carried out. IBAMA featured at the time 43 forest engineers and around 800 inspection officers for an area of 5 million square kilometres – one officer per 6.5 square km and one engineer for every 120 thousand square kilometres. 

According to Montiel, the average budget allocated to inspection and monitoring by IBAMA increased from R$ 25 million during President Fernando Henrique administration to R$ 38 million during Lula’s – and 10% of these resources were allotted to the Action Plan to Prevent Deforestation. Last year, also according to Montiel, R$ 48 million were reserved for the sector, against R$ 28 million in 2002. Besides, since 2004, R$ 27 million have been invested in the purchase of equipment such as cars and remote sensing devices. Since 2003, more than 2 thousand new environmental analysts entered the agency. In 2006, ten operations were planned and 20 carried out in Mato Grosso. In Pará, 31 were predicted and 30 were carried out. Montiel agrees, however, that more human and financial resources are needed to guarantee a more effective presence in the Amazon. “We have managed great inroads, but it is still insufficient. We are still below IBAMA’s needs in terms of command and control structure, monitoring and inspection.”  

Variation in the Deforestation Rate per Inspection Volume

Number of operations, personnel involved and deforestation per operations base Click on the chart to enlarge

Between 2003 and October 2006, 221 operations to fight environmental crimes were conducted in the Amazon, involving sometimes not only IBAMA, but also the Federal Police, Highway Police (PRF) and the Army. All in all, 814 cubic meters of timber have been seized, along with 47 tractors, 171 trucks, and 643 chainsaws. The number of these actions has displayed a direct relation between them and the deceleration of deforestation (see chart below).

Operations between 2003-2006

Curupira Operation

Among these initiatives, 11 big operations carried out by the police required intensive planning and investigation work to break up large gangs that operated in the removal and marketing of illegal wood in several states of the Amazon region. The Operations “Setembro Negro” (2003), “Ouro Verde” (2005) and “Daniel” (2006), for example, broke up gangs featuring sometimes dozens of people and which included practices such as the creation of fictional companies and the corruption of civil servants. All in all, joint action of IBAMA’s technicians and the FP resulted in the imprisonment of close to 380 people, including 71 IBAMA employees, 19 other public servants and 289 loggers, businesspeople, accountants and lobbyists.  

Operation Curupira, carried out between June 2 and 3, is considered the largest police action against environmental crimes developed in the country and caused great media repercussion. The target of the FP was a 14-year-old scheme, selling and falsifying authorisations to transport forest products – (Forest Products Transport Authorisation - Autorizações de Transporte de Produtos Florestais, ATPFs) with the help of loggers, businesspeople, dispatchers, accountants and IBAMA’s employees in Pará, Rondônia, Amazonas, Santa Catarina, Paraná, Distrito Federal and particularly in Mato Grosso. These ATPFs were printed by the Casa da Moeda (the Mint) and handled by IBAMA’s inspection officers who were supposed to verify the transit permission of any wood product. The document was sold for up to R$2 thousand by the criminals who were acting in Mato Grosso. 

FP arrested over 80 people (including high local IBAMA officials) and charged over 200 with extracting and illegally selling almost 2 million cubic meters of wood. Around 430 ghost firms operated in the commerce and transport of wood in the state, which was harshly impacted as IBAMA suspended the issuing of ATPFs for several weeks. The fact caused protest by representatives of the timber industry and several Mayors in the state. In August, the FP carried out Operation Curupira II with similar goals, aiming at gangs working in the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso. From then on, the federal government accelerated studies for the creation of an alternative to the ATPF. Last September, it was finally discontinued and the DOF (Forest Origin Document - Documento de Origem Florestal) came into effect, a system operated through the Internet for the monitoring of the commerce and transportation of wood. 

“It is evident that inspection has had an impact on the reduction of deforestation. But it is also certain that it must be increased further to keep the trend going, warns Sérgio Guimarães, coordinator of the Instituto Centro de Vida (ICV), an organisation operating in Mato Grosso. He remembers that the large joint actions by IBAMA and FP carried out from operation bases managed to increase the presence of the State in Amazonia, but still in a temporary fashion. Guimarães finds it is necessary to make this presence permanent, making in-depth analyses on the dynamics of deforestation, planning preventive inspections and articulating initiatives with the states. “In the case of Mato Grosso, with the decentralisation of forest management, there have been several inroads in making information available and in the control of the wood commerce, but there is a void in inspection and in accountability as to who commits environmental crimes”. 

“Until recently, resources were delayed or retained. In some cases, that caused the cancellation or interruption of the operations”, denounces Marcelo Marquesini, Project Director of Greenpeace. According to him, IBAMA’s operation bases located in high deforestation rate areas such as Novo Progresso and São Félix do Xingu, in Pará, Vila Rica (MT) and Apuí (AM), only work when large operations take place. Marquesini admits, however, that some bases are well structured, like in Aripuanã, in the North of Mato Grosso. Information was given by IBAMA’s technicians and inspection officers working in the field, says Marquesini. He also complains about the lack of indicators to perform an in-depth assessment of several actions foreseen in the Action Plan to Prevent Deforestation. 

A memorandum (231/2006) signed by IBAMA’s President, Marcus Barros, on November 8, forwarded to superintendents, executive managers, heads of centres and protected areas, prohibits executive agencies from making any new expense “no matter how irrelevant” under the risk of civil and administrative responsibility charges for the public agent who fails to follow this order: see in http://arruda.rits.org.br/notitia/reading/oeco/reading/pdf/financas_IBAMA_
memorando.pdf. The document also determines that measures be taken to reduce 25% of expenses for November and December. This last episode questions the possibility that the agency might improve its control actions in the Amazon region. 

It is necessary to increase IBAMA’s presence in the most critical regions in the Amazon without compromising its responsibilities with other national Biomes. It is necessary to increase the level of accountability for environmental offenders. It is necessary to create an assessment on the efficiency of control actions, their impacts and results. To that effect, it is necessary that budget cuts don’t occur on an already small budget, and, a strengthening of the Action Plan to Prevent Deforestation. One question remains: with a return to the desired upward curve on the growth of agribusiness, will IBAMA’s control actions manage to keep the downward trend in deforestation seen in the last two years? It is almost evident that the answer is no. Let us stay attuned to the new developments in the new government, because, if things aren’t good, they can always get worse. 

 ISA, Oswaldo Braga de Souza.