Ana Paula Marra
Reporter - Agência Brasil

Brasília - "This public forests management bill is not a cure-all for our country's problems of forest destruction," remarked the minister of Environment, Marina Silva, at the ceremony to ratify Bill 4776. She believes that the law regulating sustainable use of lands belonging to the nation "is one of the instruments that will empower efforts to keep our forests alive."

Application of the public forests management law will undergo a pilot test in the first Sustainable Forest District, which was created last month by presidential decree. The district is located in western Pará, in Brazil's Amazonian region.

When asked whether the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA) will be capable of monitoring the forest management plans (which represent a form of extracting products from the forest without destroying it), Silva replied that the government expanded the agency's oversight capacity substantially, by about 60%. "We held new admissions exams for the IBAMA, and the ministries are now working in an integrated manner," she observed.

The federal government estimates that, with the public forests management law that was sanctioned yesterday (2), approximately 3% of the area covered by public forests in the Amazon will be entrusted to private companies for sustainable exploitation in the next ten years. This area represents 13 million hectares.

The public forests managment legislation will permit areas to be conceded through public bidding. To be eligible for concession, an area must be listed in the National Public Forests Registry. About 60% of Brazil's forests are public nowadays. In the Amazon, the figure is 75%. However, not all these areas will be subject to bidding, since many of them, such as conservation units and indigenous territories, are classified as protected areas.

Translation: David Silberstein