The Pantanal is the world’s largest tropical wetland. This vast region stretches across parts of Paraguay, Bolivia, and Brazil, and is home to immense biodiversity. Numerous iconic wildlife live there, including jaguars, caimans, capybaras, anteaters, tapirs, howler monkeys, and one-meter-long hyacinth macaws.
Given the Pantanal’s ecological significance, the area is granted special protections under 2012 legislation (Law No. 12.651 “On the Protection of Native Forests”). Article 10 in this legislation reads:
In the wetlands and marsh plains [Pantanal], ecologically sustainable exploration is permitted, taking into account the technical recommendations of official research agencies, with new removals of native vegetation for alternative land use subject to authorization by the state environmental agency, based on the recommendations mentioned in this article.
Ecological connectivity is front and center in this legislation. Ecological corridors are mentioned three times in the law as core considerations for establishing Forest Reserves. For example:
Art. 14. The location of the Reserve area… must take into consideration the following studies and criteria:
I – the river basin plan;
II – the Ecological-Economic Zoning;
III – the formation of ecological corridors with another Legal Reserve, with a Permanent Preservation Area, with a Conservation Unit or with another legally protected area.;
IV – the areas of greatest importance for the conservation of biodiversity; and
V – the areas of greatest environmental fragility.
In February 2024, ecological connectivity in the Pantanal was given stronger protections in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul under Decree 16.388. The decree gives further guidance for implementing Law 6.160 (2023), which defines ecological corridors as “portions of natural or semi-natural ecosystems, connecting natural areas, which allow the flow of genes and the movement of biota between them, facilitating the dispersion of species and the recolonization of degraded areas, as well as the maintenance of populations that require, for their survival, large areas.”
The law also states that all public policy “dealing with conservation, protection, restoration and ecologically sustainable exploitation, within the scope of the Pantanal, must have the objective of ensuring conditions for socioeconomic development, environmental quality and protection of life in all its forms.” It lays out a set of high-level principles, including several provisions for ecological corridors such as:
“prioritization of vegetation recovery in areas… that allow the formation of ecological corridors”,
“promotion of scientific research, social and economic relations aiming at the implementation of new conservation units and ecological corridors”, and
inclusion of “identified ecological corridors” as a kind of area “specially protected from [native vegetation loss], except in the case of public utility, social interest and low impact.”
The 2024 decree sets out restrictions on certain agricultural practices and development within the Pantanal. Among these stipulations, the focus is on limiting removal of native vegetation. While landowners are permitted to clear some of their land for economic use, the decree emphasizes the importance of preserving ecological corridors, especially remnant corridors which can continue to connect reserves and other intact habitat.
The law also creates the Pantanal Climate Fund for environmental services. Priority for fund dispersal will be given to “the protection and recovery of springs and the vegetation in degraded areas that are strategic for the formation of ecological corridors.”
Further guidance is provided by Decree 774 (March 2024), which regulates a 2008 law on watershed management and defines biodiversity corridors as:
linear or approximately linear geographic space, clearly defined with the function of maintaining, increasing or recovering the connection between protected areas and remnants of native vegetation relevant to conservation, which are inseparable parts of the maintenance or restoration of the functions of dispersal, migration, movement, genetic flow and recolonization by native species in the landscape; they may be constituted by one or more types of natural habitat, planted vegetation and agroforests in areas targeted for restoration of landscape connectivity.
The Pantanal is a landscape of worldwide ecological importance, harboring incredible biodiversity and carbon sequestration. While economic pressure remains intense in Brazil and elsewhere to develop land for agriculture and other extractive use, law and policy are being put in place to regulate practices and prevent excessive destruction. Ecological connectivity is central to these Brazilian laws, with ecological corridors recognized as a high priority for conservation.
Note: All direct quotes translated from Portuguese to English by Google
Please note: This digest is intended to provide up-to-date information on policy development from a neutral, unaffiliated position as it relates to connectivity and corridor science and management.
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