Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Correspondence
  • Published:

Pantanal port licence would threaten the world’s largest tropical wetland

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 6, pages 484–485 (2022)Cite this article

Subjects

In the 1990s the stretch of this river that passes through the Pantanal (the Tramo Norte) was dredged, and barges carried soy from Cáceres to Corumbá (in barges smaller than those considered to be economically viable today), but this was halted by a judicial order in 2000. After this, only boats for tourism and local commercial trade navigate on this stretch of the river. Some dredging has continued on a modest scale to remove the yearly accumulation of sediments and allow passage of boats, and in 2017 and 2018 the amount of sediment removed increased substantially.

In 2021, the National Department of Transportation Infrastructure (DNIT) signed a contract to greatly increase the amount of sediment dredged from the Tramo Norte2. The plan is to transform the Tramo Norte into a large-scale navigation channel, requiring dredging at 17 sites to deepen and widen the channel3. This is the most fragile stretch of the Paraguay River4 and flanks three protected areas for biodiversity (Guirá State Park, Taiamã Ecological Station and Pantanal Mato-Grossense National Park, the final two being Ramsar sites), as well as one Indigenous Land (Guató) and several communities of traditional Pantanal residents (pantaneiros). The dredging lowers the water table, with effects throughout the Pantanal wetlands — in addition to the impacts of barge traffic. The proposed plan presents a weak analysis, ignores climate change scenarios that foresee severe drought seasons, and neglects socio-environmental impacts5.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Pantanal biome landscape.

Heideger Nascimento

References

  1. Conselho Estadual de Meio Ambiente do Estado de Mato Grosso - CONSEMA. 1ª Reunião Ordinária do CONSEMA, https://youtu.be/yg_uPlIZu1o (Secretaria Estadual do Meio Ambiente, Cuiabá, Mato Grosso, Brazil, 2022).

  2. Departamento Nacional de Infraestrutura de Transportes - DNIT. DNIT inicia serviço de dragagem no Rio Paraguai, https://bit.ly/3sx94Qf (Departamento Nacional de Infraestrutura de Transportes, Brasília, DF, Brazil, 2021).

  3. Universidade Federal do Paraná - UFPR. Relatório do Estudo de Viabilidade Técnica, Econômica e Ambiental da Hidrovia do Rio Paraguai, https://itti.org.br/relatorios-tecnicos/ (Instituto Tecnológico de Transportes e Infraestrutura, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil, 2015).

  4. Hamilton, S. K. Regul. Rivers 15, 289–299 (1999).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Sousa Junior, W. C., Gonçalves, D. A., Ribeiro, T. C. L. & Scur, M. C. Nova Hidrovia Paraguai-Paraná: Uma Análise Abrangente, https://bit.ly/34rQDEL (Wetlands International and Mupan, Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil, 2019).

  6. Scaloppe, L. A. E. Posicionamento público do Ministério Público do Estado de Mato Grosso ao pleno do Conselho Estadual de Meio Ambiente (Consema) e à sociedade. (Ministério Público do Estado de Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, Mato Grosso, Brazil, 2022).

  7. Secretaria Estadual do Meio Ambiente do Estado de Mato Grosso. Parecer Técnico N.º 152841 / CLEIA / SUIMIS / 2021, https://bit.ly/3oFz22S (Secretaria Estadual do Meio Ambiente, Cuiabá, Mato Grosso, Brazil, 2021).

  8. Ministério do Meio Ambiente, Comitê Nacional de Zonas Úmidas. Recomendação CNZU n. 10, de 22 de Janeiro de 2018, https://bit.ly/3oGeSpl (Ministério do Meio Ambiente, Brasília, DF, Brazil, 2018).

  9. Coll, L. Porto Recebe Licença Prévia para Operar no Pantanal e Pode Trazer mais Impactos à Região, https://bit.ly/3oIfvif (Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil, 2022).

  10. Lideranças Partidárias. Projeto de lei nº 3/2022, https://bit.ly/34rQFMT (Assembleia Legislativa do Estado de Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, Mato Grosso, Brazil, 2022).

  11. Ministério do Meio Ambiente, Comitê Nacional de Zonas Úmidas. Recomendação CNZU n. 11, de 22 de Janeiro de 2018, https://bit.ly/3oGeSpl (Ministério do Meio Ambiente, Brasília, DF, Brazil, 2018).

  12. Ruaro, R., Ferrante, L. & Fearnside, P. M. Science 372, 1049–1050 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. MapBiomas. A Dinâmica da Superfície de Água do Território Brasileiro, https://mapbiomas.org (MapBiomas, 2021).

  14. Libonati, R., DaCamara, C. C., Peres, L. F., Sander de Carvalho, L. A. & Garcia, L. C. Nature 588, 217–219 (2020).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Tomas, W. M. et al. Sci. Rep. 11, 23547 (2021).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  16. Mitsch, W. J. et al. Landsc. Ecol 28, 583–597 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Gottgens, J. F. et al. Bioscience 51, 301–308 (2001).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRRJ), Seropédica, Brazil

    Marcondes G. Coelho-Junior & Eduardo C. Silva Neto

  2. Network in Ecological Economics, Commons Governance, and Climate Justice, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

    Marcondes G. Coelho-Junior

  3. Federal University of Alagoas (UFAL), Maceió, Brazil

    Luisa M. Diele-Viegas

  4. Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa Pantanal), Corumbá, Brazil

    Debora F. Calheiros

  5. National Institute for Research in Amazonia (INPA), Manaus, Brazil

    Philip M. Fearnside

  6. Ecology Graduate Program, National Institute for Research in the Amazon (INPA), Manaus, Brazil

    Lucas Ferrante

Authors
  1. Marcondes G. Coelho-Junior
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Luisa M. Diele-Viegas
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Debora F. Calheiros
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Eduardo C. Silva Neto
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Philip M. Fearnside
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Lucas Ferrante
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

All authors have read and agreed to the published this version of the Correspondence.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Marcondes G. Coelho-Junior.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Coelho-Junior, M.G., Diele-Viegas, L.M., Calheiros, D.F. et al. Pantanal port licence would threaten the world’s largest tropical wetland. Nat Ecol Evol 6, 484–485 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-022-01724-z

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-022-01724-z

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing Anthropocene

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Anthropocene newsletter — what matters in anthropocene research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Anthropocene