Controlling the ranching boom that threatens the Amazon

Carter readily concedes he is no environmentalist, but he says the carnage around him compelled him to act.

On paper, environmental laws in the Brazilian Amazon are among the world’s most stringent. Landowners are required to keep 80 per cent of their land forested, but lack of law enforcement has undermined this regulation, while economics and politics have conspired to thwart efforts to slow deforestation. For environmental groups, it is hostile territory.

“Two of my workers were gunned down last week,” Carter said. “This is not a place for NGOs to be working. It’s a place for the cavalry.”

But even the cavalry isn’t necessarily on the right side of the law, according to Carter, who says some local officials are complicit in land-grabbing and illicit forest clearing.

“We have local politicians coming on the radio telling people to invade the land,” Carter said while piloting his Cessna over a patch of his reserva legal - the government-mandated forest easement- that was cut and burned by squatters in October, 2007. Marãiwatsede, the Xavante indigenous reservation adjoining John Carter’s ranch, has been invaded several times. At one point the tribe retained control of only a tiny fraction of its land - an army of invasores was busily cutting down trees.

Still, Carter is hopeful that the situation can be improved by converting Brazil’s strict environmental codes into a marketing advantage for ranchers by guaranteeing to buyers that certified beef is produced sustainably. Aliança da Terra’s certification system aims to take the place of a failed governance regime by creating incentives for producers to maintain their forest reserves, reforest waterways, implement fire controls, and conserve soils. Carter maintains Aliança certification could help Brazilian farmers and ranchers get premium prices by directly supplying major supermarkets and restaurant chains that can then say they are using legally and responsibly produced beef.

“We want market recognition for shouldering this conservation burden,” said Carter.

An unlikely advocate for Cain’s certification initiative is Blairo Maggi, the soy farmer-turned-governor of Mato Grosso, to whom Greenpeace gave its “Golden Chainsaw” award in 2005 for being “the Brazilian person who most contributed to Amazon destruction”. Maggi now says certification could be a ticket into more markets for Brazilian agricultural products. Even BNDES, the infamous funder of rainforest destruction, is now mandating that cattle producers demonstrate that cattle have been raised on land that was not illegally cleared.

Noting that the creation of protected areas on paper means nothing without enforcement, Carter said, “If you don’t engage the private sector, [the forest] is never going to be saved. There need to be incentives to preserve forest on private property. Ranchers are tired of being demonised. If they are presented with a viable option, they can be compelled to become part of the solution.”

In a sign that interest in certification is growing, the Forest Footprint Disclosure Project was launched in June to help identify how an organisation’s activities and supply chains contribute to forest destruction. The U.K. government-sponsored initiative will ask companies to “disclose how their operations and supply chains are impacting forests worldwide, and what is being done to manage those impacts responsibly.” Major buyers of cattle products are joining in: Both Wal-mart and Nike have announced that they will require chain-of-custody certification from suppliers, and major fast-food chains are in negotiations.

Collaborating with Woods Hole, Google Earth, and others, Carter’s group is working to devise honest land registries and a transparent certification system. This could involve high-tech methods - including satellite photo identification of ranches, tiny electrodes implanted in cattle, and electronic documentation systems - to identify responsible ranches and the cattle they produce.

Such an effort faces daunting challenges. Many producers are furious with the Greenpeace report and have threatened to bypass major beef buyers. While it may seem like an empty threat, Amazon beef is an export-driven industry and most goes to countries where environmental performance is at best a distant concern. Likewise, Brazilian shoppers haven’t shown a strong preference for the eco-credentials of products, suggesting that there remains a strong market for beef regardless of how it is produced. Gaming the system is also a possibility, especially given that BNDES is favouring the use of ear tags - which can be easily removed - for tracking cattle.