Conservation In Practice |
Corresponding author: Karen Mustin ( karen.mustin@gmail.com ) Academic editor: William Magnusson
© 2017 Karen Mustin, William D. Carvalho, Renato R. Hilário, Salustiano V. Costa-Neto, Cláudia Silva, Ivan M. Vasconcelos, Isai J. Castro, Vivianne Eilers, Érico E. Kauano, Raimundo N. G. Mendes-Junior, Cláudia Funi, Philip M. Fearnside, José M. C. Silva, Ana M. C. Euler, José Júlio Toledo.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Mustin K, Carvalho WD, Hilário RR, Costa-Neto SV, Silva CR, Vasconcelos IM, Castro IJ, Eilers V, Kauano EE, Mendes-Junior RNG, Funi C, Fearnside PM, Silva JMC, Euler AMC, Toledo JJ (2017) Biodiversity, threats and conservation challenges in the Cerrado of Amapá, an Amazonian savanna. Nature Conservation 22: 107-127. https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.22.13823
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An Amazonian savanna in northern Brazil known as the Cerrado of Amapá is under imminent threat from poor land-use planning, the expansion of large-scale agriculture and other anthropogenic pressures. These savannas house a rich and unique flora and fauna, including endemic plants and animals. However, the area remains under-sampled for most taxa, and better sampling may uncover new species. We estimate that only ~9.16% of these habitats have any kind of protection, and legislative changes threaten to further weaken or remove this protection. Here we present the status of knowledge concerning the biodiversity of the Cerrado of Amapá, its conservation status, and the main threats to the conservation of this Amazonian savanna. To secure the future of these unique and imperilled habitats, we suggest urgent expansion of protected areas, as well as measures that would promote less-damaging land uses to support the local population.
Brazil, Protected areas, Development policy, Land clearing
Tropical savannas are dynamic systems of grassland and open woodland that cover 15 to 24.6 million km2 of South America, Africa and Asia (
It has been estimated that, in Brazil, 12.3% of Amazonian savannas are within Strictly Protected areas (IUCN categories I-IV), 5.1% in Multiple Use areas (IUCN categories V-VI) and 40.3% in Indigenous Lands (
In recent years, a lack of protection of less isolated areas of Amazonian savannas (Cerrado of Amapá, Lavrados of Roraima and smaller fragments including those at Humaitá, Santarém and Monte Alegre), has facilitated the opening up of new areas to plantations of grãos and associated degradation of savanna areas (
The Cerrado of Amapá is one of the largest, least protected and arguably the most threatened complexes of Amazonian savanna in Brazil at present (see
The Cerrado of Amapá is characterised by a mosaic of areas with open woody vegetation, areas with a denser woody shrub layer, and open grassy areas with sparser shrubs and trees, and by seasonally flooded areas in the transition zone with floodplains (
The Cerrado of Amapá is among the most threatened ecosystems in the state (
Spatial distribution of dominant savanna types and protected areas in the state of Amapá. Distribution of the four dominant savanna vegetation types (based on the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) vegetation cover map for the Amazon (
Images of habitat types and soybean plantations in the Cerrado of Amapá. A Grass savanna with gallery forests in the background, showing characteristic presence of palms B Area of park savanna C Area of park savanna converted to plantations of soybeans and maize D The right-hand side of the image shows what is left of an area of park savanna, the left-hand side shows an area prepared for planting with soybeans and maize, and in the background are natural forest fragments that occur within the Cerrado of Amapá E An area of park savanna after being burned; and F flooded savanna with grass savannas and a natural forest fragment behind.
Highways and conurbations in the Cerrado of Amapá. The network of main highways (black lines), and municipal limits (grey lines) in the state of Amapá obtained from the Amapá State Environmental Secretariat (
To date, at least 378 plant species, 350 species of invertebrates, 200 bird species, 108 mammals (including 38 bat species), 26 species of fish, 41 amphibian species and 26 reptile species have been reported in the Cerrado of Amapá (
Owing to its geographic isolation and therefore relatively well-preserved state, Amapá is particularly important for the conservation of some species. For example, the only known populations of red-handed howler monkey (Alouatta belzebul) to the north of the Amazon River are found in the state of Amapá, where preliminary surveys show that occurrence of this species is predominantly limited to riparian forest within the Cerrado of Amapá (R. Hilário, unpublished data). To the south of the Amazon River, most populations of this species are highly threatened by the arc of deforestation, with just 10 small populations of this species remaining outside of the main area of deforestation pressure, in the Northeast Region of Brazil (
While the state of Amapá has ~72% of its territory covered by protected areas (
Protection also varies across the four dominant vegetation types. For example, the grass savannas, the second most common savanna type in the Cerrado of Amapá, are the least protected, with just 1.19% of their 930.22 km2 falling within the Amapá State Forest, a multiple use area (Table
Park savannas represent ~60% of the total area of the Cerrado of Amapá, and are the only dominant vegetation type to be protected outside of multiple use areas (Table
Approximately 40 km2 of park savanna is also protected by strictly protected areas – the Cabo Orange National Park and the Seringal Triunfo Private Reserve (Table
While there is no good estimate available of the total area of the Cerrado of Amapá that has been cleared and/or degraded, estimates suggest that at least 450 km2 have been cleared (
Increases in infrastructure, including the construction of a new port, are acting to increase interest in use of the Cerrado of Amapá for plantations of crops and woody species, and the area has been recently referred to as Brazil’s “final frontier” of soybean production (
The Cerrado of Amapá and other Amazonian savannas are further threatened by un-controlled burning over large areas that occurs as a result of poor fire management practices in areas where fire is used to clear areas for plantation and for livestock production (see Figure
The Cerrado of Amapá, other Amazonian savannas and forest areas that are still well-preserved in the states of Amapá and Roraima, and to the north of the Amazon River in the state of Pará, also face increased threats from the potential completion of the BR-210 Highway. The BR-210, if completed, would link Boa Vista in the state of Roraima with Macapá in the state of Amapá, crossing the state of Pará (
Total area and area protected of the four savanna types, and area of exotic plantations. Total area and area protected in each of three protection categories, of each of the four main vegetation types in the Cerrado of Amapá, and the total recorded area of plantations of exotic woody species. All values were calculated in ArcGIS v10.4.1 (
Vegetation type | Total area (km2) | Strictly Protected (IUCN I-IV) (km2) | Indigenous Lands (km2) | Multiple Use (IUCN V-VI) (km2) | Total area protected (km2) |
Park Savanna | 6048.76 | 40.241,2 | 27.033 | 414.54,5,6 | 481.77 (8%) |
Grass Savanna | 930.22 | 11.095 | 11.09 (1.19%) | ||
Woodland Savanna | 835.36 | 247.195 | 247.19 (29.6%) | ||
Shrub Savanna | 549.6 | 177.645,6 | 177.64 (32.32%) | ||
Plantations | 1657.46 | NA | |||
TOTAL | 10,021.4 | 40.24 (0.4%) | 27.03 (0.27%) | 850.42 (8.49%) | 917.69 (9.16%) |
Fire in the Cerrado of Amapá, 2007 – 2016. Total number of hot pixels between 2007 and 2016, and total area of savanna habitats per municipality, in order of total number of outbreaks between 2007 and 2016. The hot pixels were quantified from shapefiles of the occurrence of burns obtained from the databases of the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE) (https://prodwww-queimadas.dgi.inpe.br/bdqueimadas/). Based on these shapefiles, and using ArcGIS v10.4.1 (
Total fires per month in the Cerrado of Amapá, 2007 – 2016. Total number of hot pixels in the Cerrado of Amapá between 2007 and 2016 in the rainy and dry seasons (summed across all municipalities and all years). The hot pixels were quantified as described in the legend of Figure
The current network of protected areas is insufficient to ensure the protection of the Cerrado of Amapá in the face of looming threats from large-scale planting of soybeans, plantation trees and other crops. Plans are already underway for zoning of the area for these economic activities (
Other priorities for sustainable development of the Cerrado of Amapá should include implementation of sustainable management practices, including appropriate management of the fire regime (
Productivity could be increased through integrated crop-livestock-forest systems (ICLFS) in areas already planted with eucalyptus. ICLFS contribute to soil conservation, using the soil more intensively but in concert with ecological management tools such as direct planting (
Avoiding the conversion of Amazonian savannas to agriculture would contribute to maintaining climatic stability at local and regional scales (
Here we draw attention to the Cerrado of Amapá, a biodiverse and highly threatened ecosystem that has to date received very little attention and almost no protection, compared with forested parts of the state. We have shown that there is an urgent need to implement protected areas, with local communities, scientists, conservationists and policy-makers working together to construct a sustainable and equitable plan for their management. By doing so, we can ensure the sustainable development of this isolated state in the far north of Brazil, providing solutions that result in positive social, economic and biodiversity outcomes– the so-called ‘triple bottom line’ for conservation.
K.M. is supported by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship. WDC is supported by a post-doctoral scholarship CAPES - PNPD. P.M.F. thanks CNPq (305880/2007-1; 304020/2010-9; 573810/2008-7; 575853/2008-5), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Amazonas (FAPEAM: 708565), Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia (INPA: PRJ15.125) and the Brazilian Research Network on Climate Change (Rede Clima). J.M.C.S. received support from University of Miami and the Swift Action Fund. UNIFAP provided financial and logistical support for biomass estimation through PAPESQ/UNIFAP (Nº 015/2015).