Environmental Regularization Program encourages recovery of deforested areas

The Government of Minas Gerais published decree 48.127, which regulates the Environmental Regularization Program (PRA). The objective of the program is to stimulate the recovery of Permanent Preservation Areas (APP), Legal Reserve (RL) and Restricted Use Areas (AUR), which had their native vegetation in the state deforested before July 22, 2008, in addition to create bases for an economy focused on the restoration of green areas.

The PRA brings benefits to rural owners and squatters, who commit to recovering these degraded or altered areas, such as the suspension of sanctions resulting from infractions relating to the irregular suppression of vegetation that occurred before the aforementioned date, conditioned on the environmental recovery of the areas in question.

The Environmental Regularization Program was established by the 2012 Forest Code and is an instrument for the environmental regularization of rural properties in Brazil. The code also created the Rural Environmental Registry (CAR), which in Minas Gerais has 872,2 thousand registered rural properties. Now the government's effort is to ensure that all properties registered in the CAR comply with the code's requirements.

For the state technical coordinator of the Environment at Emater-MG, Ênio Resende de Souza, the PRA is a very important program not only for rural producers but for society as a whole. “The program will provide an improvement in the environmental conditions of rural properties, as producers recover strategic areas of rural property, such as areas of permanent preservation, legal reserves and areas of restricted use. There will be an improvement in biodiversity as a whole, but mainly in soil conditions and the quantity and quality of water, essential resources for the environment and also for the production process. Furthermore, the recovery of these areas brings great environmental gains for society as a whole”, argues Ênio.

In addition to the environmental recovery and regularization of the rural property, the coordinator also highlights that another advantage of the PRA is the possibility of recovering the degraded or altered area in strips and in a staggered manner. In the forestry legislation that was in force before the current legislation and this decree, for example, the person responsible for deforestation in a Permanent Preservation Area on the banks of a watercourse was obliged to recover at least the 30 meters provided for by law. Now, he will be able to recover a smaller area, according to the width of the watercourse and the size of the rural property (especially those smaller than 4 fiscal modules), as long as it meets the legally defined criteria, mainly those related to the existence of rural areas consolidated in these APPs prior to July 22, 2008.

Mixed plantings

The PRA also opens up the possibility of recovering this deforested area not only with native vegetation, but also with agroforestry systems and mixed plantations in up to 50% of the area to be recovered. “If the farmer has two hectares to be restored, in up to one hectare, he can intersperse native species with exotic plants with a long cycle such as guava, mango, coffee, papaya, among others. There are several plants (native or exotic) that perform environmental functions and at the same time produce fruit. With this, the producer can fulfill the obligation to restore the area and at the same time harvest the fruits, thus obtaining an income from the restoration of these areas”, explains Ênio.

Another permitted change is the possibility that other actors in the production process can help small rural producers in their restoration actions. “Areas with environmental liabilities need to be restored. But producers of rural properties with up to 4 tax modules have several benefits if they join the PRA. He does not need to rebuild the legal reserve area, for example. Its reserve will be the native vegetation that existed in 2008. It will also be possible, for all producers (regardless of the size of the rural property), to include APPs in the calculation of the legal reserve area. But, in parallel to the PRA, there are programs that can benefit the producer, such as the Environmental Fines Conversion Program, which allows companies to recover other areas in exchange for reducing fines”, explains the coordinator.

Environmental compensation

An important advance brought by the PRA decree points to environmental compensation. The normative instrument allows so-called environmental compensations, which involve the recovery of areas, to be carried out in PRA areas. In other words, if the environmental regularization process of a given entrepreneur requires a series of compensations in terms of area to be recovered, he will not need to acquire land for this, and can carry out the recovery in areas belonging to third parties who have joined the PRA.

The PRA is the most comprehensive environmental recovery program in Minas Gerais. According to the general director of the IEF, Antônio Malard, the government's expectation is to reach 2030 with a large increase in the coverage of native vegetation with the propulsion of the PRA. Ênio explains that for the producer to join the PRA, he must be registered with the CAR and present a project (Simplified Proposal for Environmental Regularization), which will be done electronically on the IEF website, and sign a term of commitment.

But the format of the internet platform is still being defined by the Ministry of Agriculture and the IEF. Ênio says that rural producers can contact both IEF and Emater-MG to clarify doubts and obtain more information about the program.