Meio Ambiente

The Technical Committee of the Amazon Fund met on Tuesday (December 1), at the Brazilian Forest Service (SFB), in Brasília, to attest to the reduction in the emissions of greenhouse gases resulting from reductions in deforestation in 2008.

The drop in deforestation in 2008 provided the Fund with a balance of 245 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (an amount that was not released in the atmosphere) and with potential to capture US$ 1.2 billion in donations. "The fund turns the reduction of deforestation on a system to finance the conservation and sustainable use of the Amazon", says Marco Conde, an executive from SFB.

Deforestation in 2008 was 1.29 million hectares, 34% less than the reference used in the calculations, which is 1.96 million hectares, according to the average of deforestation in the Amazon between 1996 and 2005.

The Committee's report has a fundamental role in raising revenue for the Fund, because the smaller the amount of gases that cause global warming being released into the atmosphere is, the greater the amount of resources which can be received in donations. The avoided emissions of gases equivalent to each tonne of carbon dioxide result in the capture of US$.

The Amazon Fund has already received US$ 100 million from the Norwegian government, which pledged to donate US$ 1 billion by 2015. Resources can be accessed by civil society organizations, government and companies - and are not refundable, ie, don't need to be returned.

Until now, 38 projects have been submitted to the Fund and are in different stages of evaluation by the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES), manager of the Amazon Fund. Most of them, 42%, are from civil society organizations, 18% are from state governments, 18% of private companies, 16% of municipal governments, 3% of the federal government and other 3% from public enterprises in association with mixed economy companies.

The Technical Committee of the Amazon Fund is composed of five experts appointed by the Brazilian Forum on Climate Change: Carlos Nobre, from the National Institute for Space Research (Inpe); Adalberto Val, from the Institute for Amazonian Research (Inpa); Paulo Moutinho, from the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (Ipam); Christiano Campos, from Cenepa/Petrobras; and Adalberto Verissimo, from the Amazon Institute of People and the Environment (Imazon).