Photo: Marizilda Cruppe

Today, only 8.5% of the original Atlantic Forest can be considered well-preserved, and even that is fragmented. This biome, which once covered 1.3 million km², is home to 120 million people and accounts for 70% of national GDP. Today, one of the world’s most richly biodiverse areas and also one of its most threatened, it constitutes a global conservation hotspot. The Atlantic Forest is a considerable carbon sink, of huge relevance to global climate regulation, but it is also one of the biomes most imperiled by climate change. The “Biodiversity and Climate Change in the Atlantic Forest” project was created to reduce this impact by conserving biodiversity and restoring degraded ecology, with special focus on selected Protected Area mosaics.

The project is part of a Brazil/Germany Cooperation for Sustainable Development agreement and of the International Climate Protection initiative (IKI). The Ministry for the Environment will set up an executive group to inform, monitor and deliberate whenever necessary on the project’s technical and financial execution and results. Funbio is financial and operational manager of the project and in charge of all procurement of goods and services, as well as technical and financial monitoring.

(1) bring the Rural Environmental Register into effect in the selected mosaics of Bahia (Southern Mosaic), Rio de Janeiro (Central Rio State), São Paulo and Paraná (Lagamar Mosaic); (2) finance economico-financial studies that analyze the activities needed to restore degraded areas of the Atlantic Forest; (3) implement measures to improve the infrastructure of these mosaics and; (4) set up a web platform that will enable local governments, NGOs and the general public to exchange information and experiences garnered from the municipal Atlantic Forest recovery plans.