Reducing Deforestation in
Amazonia: The rôle of
information and
communication technologies
Gilberto Câmara
National Institute for Space Research (INPE)
Brazil
Nature, 29 July 2010
Deforestation in Amazonia (big problem)
Até 10%
10 - 20%
20 – 30%
30 – 40%
40 – 50%
50 – 60%
60 – 70%
70 – 80%
80 – 90%
90 – 100%
Amazonia (4.000.000 km2 = size of Europe)
INPE’s Monitoring
Systems
time
dialy deforestation
alerts
Yearly rates of
clear cuts
Floresta
Real-time Deforestation Monitoring
Daily warnings of newly deforested large areas
“By 2020, Brazil will reduce deforestation
by 80% relative to 2005.” (pres. Lula in
Copenhagen COP-15)
Transparency builds governance
500.000 registrations
46 million protests
Policing actions: illegal wood seizure
50% of operations in 2% of the area
Transparency builds governance!
Deforestation in Brazilian Amazonia (1988-2011)
dropped from 27,000 km2 to 6,200 km2
How much it takes to survey Amazonia?
116-112
30 Tb of data
500.000 lines of code
150 man/years of software dev
200 man/years of interpreters
116-113
166-112
TerraAmazon – open source software
for large-scale land change monitoring
116-112
116-113
166-112
Innovative software for environmental monitoring
(technology transfer to developing nations)
“Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon is down by a
whopping 78% from its recent high in 2004. If Brazil
can maintain that progress, it would be the biggest
environmental success story in decades, and would set
an example to other countries that want to protect their
tropical forests.” (Editorial, 7 June 2012)
CBERS: China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite
Open access data: 2 millions images distributed
by INPE (2005-2011)
“A few satellites can cover the entire globe, but there
needs to be a system in place to ensure their images
are readily available to everyone who needs them.
Brazil has set an important precedent by making its
Earth-observation data available, and the rest of the
world should follow suit.”
CBERS as a global satellite
Urumchi
Aswa
n
Maspalomas
Chetumal
Miyun
Ghuangzhou
Bangcoc
Boa
Vista
Gabon
Malindi
Darwin
Cuiabá
Jo´burg
Alice Springs
CBERS ground stations will cover most of the Earth’s land
mass between 300N and 300S