Rainforest conservation policy assessment: the case of the Atlantic Forest in Brazil

• Ano de defesa: 2022
• Autor(a) principal: Ussami, Keyi Ando
• Tipo de documento: Tese
• Tipo de acesso: Acesso aberto
• Idioma: eng
• Instituição de defesa: Biblioteca Digitais de Teses e Dissertações da USP
• Palavras-chave em Português: Análise de impacto; Áreas protegidas; Conservação; Conservation; Deforestation; Desmatamento; Enforcement; Fiscalização; Impact analysis; Protected areas
• Link de acesso: https://www.teses.usp.br/teses/disponiveis/12/12140/tde-17122024-164647/

This dissertation assesses quantitatively the impact of a native vegetation conservation policy. We look at the Atlantic Forest Law (AFL), a zero deforestation policy launched in Brazil in 2006 that affects a huge area with both public and private lands, and evaluate its effects using recent advances in the difference-in-differences approach. We find a positive and significant effect of the AFL on the natural forest cover. Increases in forest cover occur mainly through the increase in the recovery process (allowing for native vegetation to naturally grow back or actively recovering it by planting seeds or seedlings), with positive annual net recovery even in the absence of significant changes in the forest loss process after the law. The increase in the natural forest cover and net recovery is observed immediately after the law\'s approval (in 2007), and society might have anticipated the AFL by increasing the deforestation one to three years prior to the law, which is consistent with the timing when the draft bill was approved in the Chamber of Deputies. This pre-emptive clearing delayed the net benefit from the policy in the majority of regions, taking an average of 10 years to the increase in forest cover to start producing net benefits. The analysis of heterogeneity showed that different regions responded differently to the policy, with higher effects coming from municipalities with less forests in the baseline. Our results suggest that the success of the AFL may be explained by a set of different strategies conducted by different stakeholders. Following the AFL, treated areas experienced an increase in the share of municipalities territories protected by Conservation Units, and an increase in the native forest vegetation cover in pre-existing Conservation Units. We also estimate a relative increase in the natural forest cover in private properties, whose owners seem to have complied with the law to a large extent and created new private Conservation Units. Pre-emptive clearing in the few years before the law affected both private and Conservation Units area, avoiding higher benefits from the AFL protection. Municipal governments seemed to have increased their environmental management expenditures over time, but this increase was not significantly different between treated and untreated areas. Our attempt to explore the mechanisms from the monitoring and enforcement side was not conclusive. Replication to other biomes might be limited by institutional characteristics and by the engagement of civil society.