CHANGES IN THE BRAZILIAN FOREST CODE: (II) NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON MAMMALS, BEES, AND WATER RESOURCES

[...continuation]
5. Forest legislative changes and their impacts on mammal ecology and diversity in Brazil (Mauro Galetti)
Forest ecosystems within Brazil host one of the highest levels of mammalian diversity on Earth, much of which within legally required forest set-asides in private landholdings. The Legal Reserves (RLs) and Permanent Protected Areas (APPs) of the Brazilian Forest Code provide an important strategy to maintain this diversity. Yet a proposed amendment to Brazil's 1965 forestry code would reduce protection of Brazil's forests, including the Amazon and the Atlantic forest, and bring irreversible detrimental effects to mammal diversity. Mammals are key components of forest ecosystem, providing important environmental services as pollinators, seed dispersers and ecosystem engineers. The local extinction of some species will negatively affect forest ecosystem service provisioning throughout the country. Another important effect of forest conversion within private properties, should the proposed changes happen, will be the emergence of new diseases, bringing serious public health problems in Brazil.

6. Bees, ecosystem services and the Brazilian Forest Code (Vera Lucia Imperatriz-Fonseca & Patricia Nunes-Silva)
Bees are considered the main pollinators in natural and agricultural environments. This ecosystem service is essential to the maintenance of wild plant populations and to food production on agricultural environments and it's threatened in many regions of the world. Deforestation is pointed out as one of the main causes because it affects bee populations. Conservation of forests is necessary for the maintenance of bee populations and pollination services on agricultural landscapes.

7. Potencial impacts of changes in the Forest Law in relation to water resources (José Galizia Tundisi & Takako Matsumura Tundisi)
Mosaics of vegetation, riparian forests, and wetlands have an important quantitative and qualitative role on the hydrological cycle. Riparian forests protect the water quality of rivers, lakes and reservoirs. Wetlands control floods, sedimentation and regulate the water quality by enhancing processes such as denitrification, phosphorus and heavy metal retention. Both ecosystems of transition are fundamental. The removal of wetlands and forests (riparian and mosaics of vegetation) affects environmental services of these ecosystems, causing loss of economic assets of the capital natural and accelerating degradation of rivers, lakes, reservoirs and the watersheds. Protection of these ecosystems of transition is thus fundamental for the development of agriculture. The loss of services affects society, human health, increasing costs of recovery and deteriorating human-ecological relationships.

CHANGES IN THE BRAZILIAN FOREST CODE: (I) NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON THE ICHTHYOFAUNA, AMPHIBIANS, REPTILES, AND BIRDS

Brief comments on impacts that scientific studies have pointed out as plausible, as consequences of modifications being proposed in the Brazilian Forest Code are given here (in two postages). The original articles were published in BIOTANEOTROPICA, vol. 10, n.4, 2010, a publication of the “FAPESP – Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo”. [N.B. bold types are of my responsibility]

In this first postage we will present the summaries of impacts on fish, amphibians, reptiles, and birds.

1. Changes in the Brazilian Forest Code: potential impacts on the ichthyofauna (Lilian Casatti).
In this paper is presented an analysis of possible impacts that the reduction of native vegetation, especially riparian forests, can have on the fish fauna. Three sets of primary functional aspects performed by riparian forests are discussed: transferring of solar energy to the aquatic environment, trapping nutrients and sediments that enter the rivers and transfer of organic material between the terrestrial and aquatic environments. Any modification which results in further loss of native vegetation, in permanent preservation areas or in protection reserves, may generate losses of species, faunal homogenization and reduction of fish biomass.

2. The review of the Brazilian Forest Act: harmful effects on amphibian conservation (Luís Felipe Toledo)
In the last months there is a growing discussion in Brazil about a new Brazilian Forest Act (Código Florestal). This new proposal, in substitution to the current Act, includes modifications which will affect negatively natural populations of amphibians. Besides the deleterious impacts upon amphibians, it will also harm the national and international human populations. Among the possible effects, in consequence of the associate amphibian population declines or complete loss, we cite the increase of agricultural production costs, loss of primary sources of compounds for the medical industry, generalized ecological disequilibrium, eutrofication of water bodies, increase in the costs of water (for humans) treatment, increase of agricultural plagues, and increase of insect borne diseases. All these effects are of high relevance, even more if we consider the population declines of amphibians, the most threatened terrestrial vertebrate group in the world. Therefore, we propose that if a new Forest Act must be prepared, that it should be based, besides in unlikely immediate economical benefits to farm owners, in scientific knowledge which benefits nature conservancy, economy, health, and human welfare.

3. Potential impacts of changes in the Brazilian Forest Code on reptiles (Otavio Augusto Vuolo Marques; Cristiano Nogueira; Marcio Martins; & Ricardo Jannini Sawaya).
We evaluate the potential impacts on Brazilian reptiles (721 species already described), if the proposed changes in the Brazilian Forest Code are approved. The possibility of environmental compensation (a legal obligation in case of disturbance of natural habitats) in basins or micro basins different from that in which the disturbance occurred would have harmful effects on reptile diversity. Some reptile genera include species that rarely co-occur in space. Thus, conservation action planning based on naturally smaller scales, such as micro basins, is most suitable to maintain species composition across large regions. The proposed changes also include the removal of mountaintops as Areas of Permanent Preservation (APP, areas which must be permanently protected, despite the fact that they are not part of a park), as well as a reduction in the width of gallery forests and protected riparian habitats (which are APPs). Many Brazilian reptiles are restricted to high elevation areas, whereas others dwell only or mostly in gallery forests and riparian areas. Thus, the habitat loss that would result from these two changes could make some reptiles vulnerable to extinction. The proposed changes also include allowing the restoration of the Legal Reserves (LR, the reserves of natural vegetation which landowners have to keep in private areas) using exotic plant species. There are evidences that many Brazilian reptiles are not able to persist in human-modified environments like forests composed of exotic trees. The proposed changes also allow the compensation of disturbances imposed on LR inside existing protected areas. However, existing protected areas are not sufficient for the maintenance of reptile diversity in Brazil (mainly because many species have restricted distributions). If approved, the proposed changes in the code will impose significant negative effects on the Brazilian reptile fauna, an important component of the country's natural heritage. Furthermore, unknown molecules with potential for pharmaceutical use could also be lost.

4. Potential impacts of the changes proposed in the Brazilian Forest Code on birds (Pedro Ferreira Develey & Tatiana Pongiluppi)
Proposed changes in the current Brazilian Forest Code can lead to the reduction of native vegetation (forests, grasslands and wetlands) impacting directly many bird species. In Brazil, 17 globally threatened species are dependent of riverine forests and eight of these are restricted to the Brazilian territory. A decrease in the width of the area that should be protected as Permanent Preservation Areas (Área de Preservação Permanente - APP) can lead to significant population losses that would put at risk the integrity of populations and, in some cases, the survival of species. In fragmented landscapes, the APPs function as corridors, allowing the dispersion of birds through the matrix. Legal Reserve (Reserva Legal) areas should be maintained complementary to APPs, as the avifauna composition varies in areas located near and far from water bodies. Environmental heterogeneity is crucial to the maintenance of the bird community integrity. Even small patches of forest are important to the avifauna, working as stepping stones that, like the corridors, enable forest birds to move across the landscape. Birds are important predators, dispersers, and pollinators in agricultural ecosystems: in the Tropical region, areas with high bird diversity are significantly correlated with the highest rates of arthropods' removal, including those considered pests. Thus, proposed changes in the current Forest Code may represent a negative impact not only in relation to biodiversity, but also in regarding the agricultural production.
[Continued...]

SHUT YOUR WINDOWS AT 5 O’CLOCK P.M. EVERY DAY FROM NOVEMBER TO MARCH: ALATE SWARMING OF TERMITES

Two species of dry wood termites commonly found in the tropical Atlantic forest of Brazil, Cryptotermis brevis and C. dudleyi, were studied by Bandeira, A.G.; Silva, M.P.da e Vasconcellos,A. [Acta Biologica Leopoldinensia, v. 23, n. 2, 2001]. Swarmings occurred during nine months, from October to May in colonies of C. brevis with a peak from November to December. And C. dudleyi had a swarming period from December to June with a peak from February to March. The former species showed to be 5.4 times more efficient to form new colonies than the latter species.

The authors suggested that liberation of alates by colonies of both species during such long periods of the year, make them a most likely pest of structural timber in tropical areas; like in the campus of the Federal University of Paraíba, in João Pessoa, northeastern Brazil, where this study was performed. Cryptotermis brevis was reported by the authors as the worst destroyer of structural timber. However, giving a species a pest status is subjective because “without humans there would be no pest”, as pointed out by “Begon et al. (1990). Ecology: from individuals to ecosystems. London, Blackwell”.

It is also important to note that all the observed dispersion flights occurred between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. Since they become less visible to predators at twilight time, the authors interpreted the highest swarming at that period of the day as a survival strategy of both species. That is why the title of this brief assay: a warning to Brazilians living in Paraíba state (and “surroundings”).

The photos shown here illustrate termites proliferation in the campus: (top) on old plywood desks discharged unduly outside a building, close to the forest; (middle) some nests on a tree in a parking lot in front of a bank agency in the campus; and (below) on a shrub in the forest. The termite nests on a tree in the parking lot might suggest that the tree is not healthy (outside its natural habitat, the forest), and that a preventive action by eliminating such focus of termites must be carried out; as well as the focus of termites on plywood timber of the old school desks.

CCS -CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE. Climate Talks Prove Growing Need for it.

LET'S PRAY FOR DURBAN good results!!!

[From SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, 10th December 2011]

DURBAN, South Africa — The roughly 3,000 fossil fuel–fired power plants in North America — Canada, Mexico and the U.S. — emit 6 percent of global greenhouse gases, or nearly as much as all of the European Union. In fact, coal-fired power plants around the globe are the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.

In other words, coal is largely responsible for climate change. Burning coal alone contributes more than half of global greenhouse gas emissions from human activity. "Whatever you hear from time to time, a big part of electricity is produced from coal," argued Philippe Joubert, deputy CEO of power equipment manufacturer Alstom at the climate talks here on December 6. "This will continue."

That's why so-called carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a mark of seriousness in efforts to combat climate change; Joubert calls it "mandatory." Because the world seems to have little interest in restraining coal burning — it continues to increase, driven largely by China and India — capturing the CO2 before it enters the atmosphere is the only real way to tackle such emissions.

"There are more than enough discovered hydrocarbons to fry the planet," Lord Nicholas Stern of the London School of Economics and Political Science told Scientific American. "You can do CCS or you can bust two degrees [Celsius of warming]."

That is why the negotiations here in Durban approved CCS as a potential technology under the Clean Development Mechanism — a way to provide funds from developed to developing countries for emission-reducing infrastructure in return for credit against the developed countries' CO2 emission quotas. Unfortunately, the mechanism is a part of the Kyoto Protocol. And the protocol will expire at the end of next year without a successor — unless one is agreed on this week in Durban.

Regardless, the world seems to be closing down more CCS plants than it opens: The E.U.'s flagship CCS project at Schwarze Pumpe was cancelled on December 5 due to local German opposition. Canada has had a CO2-sequestration project running for years now in the Weyburn oil field in Saskatchewan but has yet to expand operations to the tar sands that are single-handedly increasing that country's emissions — which violate its obligations under Kyoto. U.S. power company AEP recently turned down the opportunity to expand the world's first project to combine CO2 capture and storage at one site — Mountaineer in West Virginia. China, the world's largest emitter largely because of its coal burning, has a few pilot projects and is considering more.

Even more importantly, whereas China may be able to afford CCS, other developing countries like South Africa certainly cannot at a price of roughly $1 billion to add the technology to a one-gigawatt coal-fired power plant (per Brad Page, CEO of the Global CCS Institute in Australia). And South Africa consumes a lot of coal, generating 92 percent of its electricity and exporting $10 billion worth to Europe and China — even turning it into 30 percent of the diesel for trucks and jet fuel that it uses domestically.

In South Africa's bid to continue economic growth — and spread electricity to the more than 2 million South Africans who currently lack it — the republic is building more coal-fired plants. In fact, national utility Eskom recently received a $3.75-billion loan from the World Bank to build six 800-megawatt coal-burning units at the Medupi power plant in Limpopo Province as well as much smaller renewables projects.