Systemic Conservation, REDD, and the Future of the Amazon Basin

In a new article, “Systemic Conservation, REDD, and the Future of the Amazon Basin”, three scientists (Daniel Nepstad, David McGrath, Britaldo Soares Filho) with six decades of experience studying the Amazon region present a retrospective of the last six years and two plausible scenarios for the Amazon region in 2020.  In a scenario of “accelerated frontier expansion”, the gains of the last six years are lost, deforestation rates go up, a widespread forest dieback sets in through a vicious cycle of drought and fire, and large-scale infra-structure projects disrupt the fisheries and flows of the region’s mighty rivers.  In an alternative pathway of “low emission rural development”, REDD takes root through emerging compliance markets (e.g., with California) and linkages with agricultural commodity market reform, and rapidly evolves into a new model of rural development.  Low emission rural development could be reinforced by advances in frontier governance, by a Basin-wide plan for managing the dieback, by co-management systems for managing fisheries and forests, and through alternatives to hydro-electric energy generation.