The Cerrado biome is a global biodiversity hotspot and its vegetation has special relevance in mitigating climate change  It is one of the largest water reservoirs in the country, and plays a key role in food production, providing water, soil, pollination and pest control – important ecosystem services. Agricultural production in the Cerrado is an important part of the Brazilian economy and the north of the biome was determined as the agricultural frontier in MATOPIBA (Maranhão, Tocantins, Piauí and Bahia), where an expansion of 3 to 5.2 Mha is projected. However, agricultural productivity in the Cerrado is threatened both by the commitment it causes to the ecosystem services on which it depends and by the accentuation of the drought envisaged in the climate change scenarios. Commodity farming is the main cause of deforestation in MATOPIBA, and the main threat to biodiversity in the Cerrado. Although the area planted with soybeans in this region has grown steadily in recent years, agricultural productivity has been very sensitive and unstable.

In this context, the biologist and consultant Branca Opazo Medina presented in the CSRio Seminar “Conservation of the Cerrado on the last large Brazilian agricultural frontier, MATOPIBA”, whose results of the mapping of the region, related to water APPs and other protected areas, reveal socioeconomic data and vulnerability to drought in the context of climate change.

The lecture was held on June 27, 2019, at PUC-Rio.

Watch the full presentation (in Portuguese only)