Implicações Sociais, Econômicas e Ambientais de Uma Iniciativa de Manejo Florestal Comunitário em Assentamento na Amazônia Oriental

This study aimed to understand the connections among participation in community forest management (CFM), plot turnover, household income and deforestation. The empirical research was carried out in an environmentally focused land reform settlement near the Transamazon highway, the Virola-Jatobá Sustainable Development Project (PDS) in the municipality of Anapu, Pará state, Brazil. In this settlement, CFM has been for over a decade a major governmental instrument to curb deforestation, avoid land turnover and improve income. Our analysis of a community-company agreement for forest management shows that resources derived from the sale of timber were unable to reduce spatial mobility, control deforestation and provide sustainable livelihoods. Direct observation in anthropological action research shows that CFM will only succeed if resulting from collective action assembling the diverse and divergent social groups in the PDS. We also identified that specific social norms related to swidden, slash-and-burn fields have the potential to generate collective action, even towards forest management. Considering the local diversity of actors and complexity of contexts, we conclude that the adjustment of social norms connecting swidden fields to forest management is a critical condition for the effectiveness of CFM and the environmental land reform modality