Restoration of Brazil’s Atlantic Forest on Private Land

Brazil’s Atlantic Forest region accounts for 80 percent of the country’s GDP, hosts 70 percent of its population, and has lost over 90 percent of its original forest cover. The forest was once a continuous stretch of tropical and subtropical rainforest covering almost 1.4 million square kilometers. USAID’s Global Development Alliance is working to preserve and restore some of these forests. The goal is to create “conservation corridors” linking isolated forest fragments to one another through agreements between private landowners, corporate landowners, and environmental conservation groups.

With help from USAID, the Instituto BioAtlântica (IBio)—a Brazilian conservation group—has reached out to both conservation-minded landowners and large corporations. The corporations, who together own 150,000 hectares of native Atlantic Forest, are partnering with IBio to reforest lands, link forests through “biodiversity corridors,” and apply lessons learned from private conservationists. In one year, the program secured 9000 hectares of protected native and restored forests.

Source:

https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/success/files/ss_br_forests.pdf