The Role of Private Reserves of Natural Heritage (RPPN) on natural vegetation dynamics in Brazilian biomes

Despite having the richest biodiversity in the world, Brazil has lost vegetation cover in all biomes, with the agribusiness being an important driver of such changes. Different governance systems, decentralized actions and public policies have been developed to control deforestation, and in this study, we focus on the role of Private Reserves of Natural Heritage (RPPN) as an instrument for the conservation and recovery of natural vegetation. Therefore, we raise the following questions: How many RPPNs are there and what are their spatial distribution? Are RPPNs an important mean of conservation/restoration of Brazilian biomes? Do they contribute (at statistically significant levels) to the conservation of natural vegetation within their respective rural properties compared with rural properties without private reserves? Thus, we investigated the natural vegetation cover (between 1990 and 2018) in rural properties with and without RPPNs looking at the municipalities where RPPNs are found, and analyzing the results at country and biome levels. The results indicate that RPPNs are significantly associated with gains in natural vegetation cover in the Cerrado, Caatinga and Atlantic Forest biomes. We conclude that RPPNs have great potential in recovering natural landscapes associated to the Brazilian biomes. However, their few numbers across the Brazilian territory (1750 units of RPPN) and spatially highly concentrated in the Cerrado and Atlantic Forest, challenges the capacity of this conservation strategy to deal with the environmental degradation promoted by the expansion of economics activities across the country.

Automated summary

Despite Brazil's rich biodiversity, vegetation cover in all biomes has been lost, with agribusiness playing a major role. The study investigates the role of Private Reserves of Natural Heritage (RPPN) in conserving and restoring natural vegetation in Brazil. It examines the spatial distribution of RPPNs, their impact on natural vegetation cover, and their contribution to conservation compared to rural properties without reserves. The results show that RPPNs significantly contribute to the gain in natural vegetation cover in specific biomes, but their limited number and concentration in certain regions pose challenges to their effectiveness.