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Program: Securing protection of Kayapó Indigenous Territories in the southeastern Amazon region of Brazil
Purpose | Actions and Results | Background

Program Status

Ongoing (since 2007).

Program Partners and Personnel

ICFC is one of several organizations involved in this program, the others being Conservation International do Brasil (CI), the Environmental Defense Fund, the Brazilian NGO Instituto Socioambiental, and the Wild Foundation. Our local partners are two Brazilian non-governmental organizations: the Associação Floresta Protegida (AFP) and Instituto Kabu (IK). AFP and IK work in collaboration with FUNAI, the Brazilian government agency responsible for indigenous people.

Key people for this program are: Barbara Zimmerman, formerly CI's pioneering leader of the Kayapó program and now ICFC's Brazil program director; Adriano Jerozolimski of AFP; and Nejamrô Kayapó and Luis Carlos Sampaio of IK.

Purpose

The Kayapó Indigenous people of Brazil protect 11-million hectares of their lands from deforestation in the highly threatened southeastern Amazon region of Brazil. This vast block (an area twice the size of Nova Scotia) of legally ratified Kayapó Indigenous Territories is the largest tract of tropical forest in the world under some form of protection.

The current ICFC program builds on work started by Conservation International (CI) in 1992 when it began working with the Kayapó to build management capacity, economic autonomy, and local institutions in order to guarantee long-term conservation of Kayapó Indigenous Territories and culture.

Our program has several components:

  • Developing a system of regular monitoring of border integrity and threats to Kayapó territories, and provisioning for surveillance and territorial boundary demarcation;
  • Strengthening the capacity of the Kayapó and their institutions for territorial control and sustainable management of their natural resources;
  • Facilitating communication and cooperation among Kayapó communities to enable them to act in concert to protect their land and interests;
  • Establishing sustainable economic enterprises to further economic autonomy of all Kayapó communities;
  • Informing Kayapó communities about opportunities for long-term financing of their conservation efforts: (1) through the creation of a endowment fund spearheaded by CI; and (2) through the developing voluntary market in REDD (reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation) carbon credit trading; and involving the Kayapó in related decision making.

Actions and Results

Territorial surveillance and boundary demarcation

In 2007:
  1. We provided surveillance infrastructure (boats and radios) as needed to the new community entrants to the Associação Floresta Protegida — Krinu, Kokokwuedja, Kubenkranken and Kokraimoro — and made arrangements for boat maintenance and for installation of radios.
  2. We acquired a 4X4 vehicle to support surveillance activities along approximately 150 km of the northeastern border that is road accessible. (Money saved on the vehicle purchase was used for badly needed upgrades to the Pinkaiti reearch station at A'Ukre village.)
  3. The new transportation and communication resources has greatly facilitiated surveillance activities. The vehicle also enabled the transportions of material and people to several Kayapó villages for conservation related purposes: a capacity building course on stingless bee keeping; and a field course on conservation and sustainable development;
In 2009:
  1. The Instituto Kabu (IK) organized and performed precision overflight surveillance along the entire western border and northwestern border of Kayapó lands — a flight of approximately 600 km. Happily, no invasions were detected.
  2. IK facilitated meetings of Kayapó leaders with the municipal government of Novo Progresso in order to obtain building space for setting up a regional FUNAI office. The physical presence of FUNAI in the area will contribute greatly to the effectiveness of surveillance and territorial control. (FUNAI has legal authority for removing invaders and enforcing indigenous rights.)

Community coordination, information and capacity building


    Instituto Kabu negotiation with FUNAI for highway impact compensation package.
  1. The Instituto Kabu (IK) facilitated a series of meetings of the Mekranoti and Bau Kayapó with their new regional FUNAI administration of Itaituba in Para State and with the mayor and city councilors of the frontier town of Guarant do Norte, resulting in inclusion of the communities in government health, education and indigenous rights services.
  2. IK negotiated a compensation package from the government to compensate and strengthen territorial control by the western Kayapó after the paving of the BR-163 highway "opens floodgates" to colonization and deforestation along their border. As a first part of the compensation package, the Department of Transport donated a 4X4 truck to the IK for surveillance.
  3. IK and AFP held meetings in various communities to explain and consult about the potential of REDD carbon credit funding to support conservation of Kayapó forested lands. A consensus was reached in support of pursuing this.

Sustainable economic development

In 2007, we conducted a pilot project with the Kendjam community to assess the feasibility of a form of small-scale ecotourism in which the community hosted a sportfishing expedition on the Iriri River for paying visitors. The project was a success from the perspective of both the community and the visitors.

Tree Seed Workshop
    In 2009:
  1. Instituto Kabu (IK) sent samples of copaiba oil (an aromatic resin tapped from trees) for analysis to a cosmetic company in Sao Paulo as a first step toward a partnership for a copaiba enterprise by the Kayapó. IK also sent samples of copaiba oil, brazil nut oil and babaçu palm oil to other interested buyers or intermediaries.
  2. IK organized participation of 10 Kayapó from the three IK communities of Bau, Kubenkokre and Pukanu in capacity-building workshop on "Harvest, Production, Storage and Commercialization of Tree Seeds".
  3. In March, the Brazilian NGO "Imaflora", an FSC certifying agency, audited Bau territory for compliance for their FSC certification for non-timber forest products. Bau passed the audit but it was noted that a major problem encountered by this community is a lack of reliable buyers for their Brazil nut oil production. Imaflora informed the community that they would engage a consultant to negotiate partnerships with reliable domestic and international buyers for Bau's Brazil nut oil and other non-timber forest products.
  4. In May, IK helped the community of Pukanu negotiate sale of their 2009 Brazil nut harvest (6.3 tons; 5,714 kg) at a reasonable price, with the result that Pukanu made almost R$7,000, enough to maintain an incentive in this small community for further development of a Brazil nut enterprise. The IK will seek to improve Pukanu Brazil nut quality and price as AFP is doing for eastern communities by implementing infrastructure and best practices and obtaining FSC and organic certification.
  5. In June, IK organized a visit from the UK NGO "Indigenous People's Cultural Support Trust" (IPCST). This NGO is undertaking to help Bau find long-term buyers for their FSC and organic certified Brazil nut oil and this relationship has already resulted in sales and in the commissioning of samples of six other species of fruit and nut oils.

Background

See also the Wild Foundation's excellent write-up.

The Xingu River, a major tributary of the Amazon in Brazil, begins in the semi-deciduous forests and woodland-savannas of Mato Grosso state, and flows north for 2,700 km across greatly varying topography before ending in the wet forests of the Amazon near Belem, Para. The Xingu drains from ancient crystalline Precambrian shield and is, therefore, a clear water river picking up sediments and nutrients from the forests it flows through.


Figure 1. The Xingu River Basin is shown as the lime green area (Brazil as turquoise

The Xingu is a prominent national point of reference for biological and cultural diversity. It spans major tropical biomes from savanna (cerrado) in the headwaters of the south to semi-deciduous and evergreen wet canopy forests of the southern, mid- and northern regions. More than 20 linguistically differentiated indigenous cultures that hold millennia's worth of ecological knowledge inhabit the forests of the Xingu. Throughout the past two centuries, there has been much migration into the region from other parts of Brazil such that the Xingu now forms a cultural mosaic representing the whole of Brazil. The region is a paradigm of the modern Amazon dynamic of many different social, economic, cultural, and environmental interests disputing a wealth of natural resources.

Within the last four decades, the Xingu has fallen under increasingly intense deforestation pressure as the agricultural frontier inexorably expands north and west. An "arc of fire" constituting the highest rate of deforestation in Brazil and indeed, one of the highest in the world, sweeps across the region. This intensifying process of occupation and agricultural expansion, often accompanied by violent land conflict in the lawless frontier, follows road construction especially the perimetral framework of national highways including the BR-210 in the north; the BR-163 running north to south from Santarem to Cuiaba, and the BR-158. Completion of the paving of these highways — which will lead to further increases in immigration and deforestation — is a government infrastructure priority.


Figure 2. Satellite image of Kayapó lands and most of the Xingu Indigenous Park (to the south) showing plumes of smoke rising from burning of primary forest remnants outside of the Indigenous Territories. Dark green areas are indigenous lands and light brown areas area ranch and agricultural land.

With adequate roads and suitable soils, the Xingu has become an important centre for cattle production (occupying the greatest tracts of land and by far the greatest driver of deforestation), logging (almost all illegal) and production of soy bean for export. Dozens of towns have sprung up along roads to support frontier activities and many hundreds of thousands of people depend on the frontier economy.

At the same time as this tsunami of forest destruction threatens to engulf the region, an enormous 28.8-million-ha network of protected areas (including both ratified indigenous territories and conservation areas) secures protection in law of 56% of the Xingu basin. This protected areas corridor is the great hope for conservation of multi-landscape scale tracts of southeastern Amazonian forest with all its magnificent richness of biodiversity, indigenous cultures and ecosystem services. Indigenous lands of the Xingu are of particular importance because they occupy two thirds of the protected areas corridor and possess de facto protection services — their indigenous inhabitants. Over the past three decades, indigenous territories have proved formidable barriers to forest destruction especially from east to west and south to north (Figure 2; see also Nepstad et al., 2006. Inhibition of Amazon deforestation and fire by parks and Indigenous lands. Conservation Biology, 20: 65-73.). However, outside pressure on the ecological and socio-cultural integrity of these areas continues to build and expand. If borders are not constantly monitored in this lawless region of weak governance, ranchers, colonists, fraudulent land developers, commercial fishermen, loggers and gold-miners inevitably invade protected areas. If they cannot gain clandestine entry, loggers will buy off certain members of indigenous communities to obtain access to the rich timber stocks on their lands. When they lack information and sustainable economic alternatives, indigenous peoples are vulnerable to outside pressure to liquidate their resources.

The Kayapó program is designed by ICFC and its partners to support a process of conservation and sustainable development in the almost 11,000,000 ha block of Kayapó Indigenous territories that anchor the Xingu Protected Areas corridor. It entails continuing support for capacity building with Kayapó local institutions and communities for economic and ecological sustainability, with the ultimate aim of ensuring long-term protection of the ecological integrity of Kayapó indigenous territories and of Kayapó culture.

The Kayapó for the most part have been able to protect their lands from invasion and occupation by ranchers and exercise control over access to resources (timber, gold, fish) on their lands. But government support for these protected areas is tenuous and the over the past decade NGOs have played a cruicial role in bringing about monitoring and control of reserve boundaries, legal actions by the national Brazilian Indian agency and law enforcement, building of local institutions and necessary infrastructure, and economic development for communities. Local Kayapó organizations are recent and need considerable training and capacity building to be able to assume greater responsibility for managing their lands and resources. Meanwhile, pressure continues to build on indigenous territories of the southeastern Amazon which belong principally to the Kayapó. The BR 163 highway and other roads surrounding the reservation lands will be paved, demand for beef and soy will increase, as will, in all likelihood, demand for biofuels.

The current program by ICFC and its partners provides Kayapó communities and government agencies with the technical resources (remote sensing analysis, mapping) they need in order to identify threats and locate incursions. It also equips local communities with the transportation and communication infrastructure necessary to patrol borders and protect their territories. Finally, it works to further improve economic options and income in the communities by better organizing production and processing of non-timber forest products, identifying potential new products and markets, and adding value through certification.

ICFC and our partners follow four basic principles to help the Kayapó achieve economic autonomy based on the sustainable management of non-timber natural resources:

  1. all members of the community must benefit from the enterprise;
  2. the enterprise must be linked directly to conservation (a community will not receive outside support if engaging in liquidation of natural resources or other illegal activity);
  3. the enterprise must be designed around normative aboriginal values of equity, cooperation, and reciprocity that are expressed in terms of local authority achieved by consensus and common- property access; rather than relying on western normative values of competition, exclusive rights to resources, and centralized management authority;
  4. technical and administrative support must be provided long-term by an outside agency.

Conservation significance of Kayapó lands

Kayapó indigenous lands are of particular conservation value because of the interdigitation of both closed-canopy Amazonian forest and central Brazilian savanna or cerrado. Several mammals: (white-lipped peccary [Tayassu pecari], giant otter [Pteronura brasiliensis], giant armadillo [Priodontes maximus], jaguar [Panthera onca]) and at least one bird species (hyacinth macaw [Anodorhynchus hyacinthinus]) native to the southeastern Amazon and listed as endangered are regularly encountered within XPAC. Vulnerable vertebrate species occurring east of the Xingu River, but entirely or largely unprotected outside XPAC include the eastern Amazonian bearded saki monkey (Chiropotes satanas utahicki), red-handed howler monkey (Alouatta belzebul epiphenotype discolor), white-whiskered spider monkey (Ateles marginatus), neotropical otter (Lutra longicaudis), bush dog (Speothos venaticus), blue-winged macaw (Ara maracana), bare-faced curassow (Crax fasciolata), razor-billed curassow (Mitu tuberosa), red-throated piping guan (Pipile cujubi), umbrellabird (Cephalopterus ornatus), bare-necked fruitcrow (Gymnoderus phoetidus), wood stork (Mycteria americana), and chestnut-throated spinetail (Synallaxis cherriei).

In addition, surveys have shown that much of the 11-million-ha block of Kayapó territory remains reasonably undisturbed as judged by population densities of some of the most vulnerable vertebrate species found in Amazonian forests. Large-bodied game species, which are preferred by local peoples throughout the Amazon are abundant within the hunting range of Kayapó communities. The relatively high densities of several of these game animals including large cracids, lowland tapir, and white-lipped peccary, indicate an ecosystem that is not severely impacted by hunting because the source areas (i.e. non-hunted areas) for these animals are very large. Indeed, no other large forest reserve in southeastern Amazonia currently safeguards a full complement of disturbance-sensitive wildlife and the entire vegetation transition from open savanna (cerrado) to close-canopy forests (Zimmerman et al. 2001).

Of critical conservation significance as well, Kayapó lands and the contiguous Xingu Indigenous Park to the south protect more than four hundred kilometers of the Xingu river from degradation by deforestation, pollution and over-fishing. Preliminary surveys indicate that as many as 1,500 fish species inhabit the Xingu River. Fish are the most important source of protein for local people of the Xingu. Sixteen species of fish are considered endemic to the Xingu as they have only ever been collected from this watershed.

Kayapó territories constitute 40% of the exceptionally large and connected Xingu Protected Areas Corridor and alone are large enough to protect large scale ecological processes. It is known, for example, that very large areas are required for preservation of tropical tree species because species usually occur rarely at the local scale. In one Amazonian study, 88% of 825 tree species occurred at low densities of less than one individual per ha locally; but had high absolute population sizes across landscapes. Most tropical tree species depend on co-evolved animal vectors for pollination and seed dispersal across large inter-individual distances — small areas do not contain enough individuals or viable animal vector populations for regeneration of many forest tree species over the long term. The dauntingly intricate web of interdependence among Amazonian species requires large areas to function and persist.

Beyond the very considerable ecological conservation value of the Xingu protected areas, the corridor is a critical test case of the feasibility of frontier governance. Soares, Nepstad et al.'s "governance scenario" projects about half as much deforestation as business-as-usual by 2050, provided that protected area corridors and reserve mosaics on active frontiers along major roads can effectively prevent frontier expansion and increased deforestation and fires (Soares et al., 2006). The Xingu Corridor, lies directly across the arc of deforestation, amidst the most dynamic, high-deforestation regions of the Amazon frontier. Showing how protected areas can be created, effectively implemented and protected here will have enormous demonstration value for other frontier reserves. The success or failure of the Xingu reserves corridor will also be closely observed by regional and national opponents of large-scale conservation, e.g., illegal occupants of public lands, illegal loggers.

In conclusion, there is no greater opportunity in the world than Kayapó lands for conservation of tropical forest wilderness at a multi-landscape scale. Consolidation of the Xingu Corridor is the only remaining possibility for conserving the last remaining large, intact native forest region of the southeastern Amazon, and maintaining the connectivity of this ecoregion with the western Amazon. Kayapó lands play a particularly important role in the Xingu corridor because of their huge extent under the control of a single, historically well organized society of low population density that is already on its way to acquiring the skills needed for protected areas management in the 21st century. Conservation of the Xingu corridor will contribute substantially to maintaining rainfall regimes needed for large scale conservation both locally and in the western Amazon. The program will also contribute to developing a pilot payment for ecosystem services program (REDD carbon offsets project).

See also the Wild Foundation's page on Kayapó Culture and History.

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