Semas and Incra sign agreement to promote environmental regularization of settlements in Pará

The State Secretariat for the Environment, Climate and Sustainability of Pará (Semas), through the Regulariza Pará Program, and the National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (Incra) signed, this Tuesday (9), in Brasília (DF), a technical cooperation agreement to jointly promote environmental regularization actions in agrarian reform settlements located in the State of Pará. The strategies and actions effectively seek to work on the registration, rectification, and analysis of the Rural Environmental Registry (CAR), the Plans for the Recovery of Degraded and Altered Areas, and adherence to the Environmental Regularization Program, instruments of the Forest Code.

The cooperation agreement is the result of intense joint work between the environmental and land agencies over the past two years, which sought to develop methodologies and procedures to advance environmental regularity in the areas of settlements under Incra's management.

The actions began with technical meetings on defining flows and procedures for registration, rectification, and analysis of Rural Environmental Registries; discussions on the need for adjustments and evolution in the platforms and geotechnological databases, on the need for the preparation of technical normative documents that institutionalize the methodologies, flows, and procedures for regularization; planning and joint actions for on-site environmental regularization efforts in settlements in different municipalities of the State, in addition to discussions on the regularization of environmental liabilities, deforestation, and environmental embargoes, thus seeking to restore areas of legal reserve and permanent preservation areas.

During the meeting this Tuesday (9), the agreement was formalized between representatives of Semas and the presidency of Incra, at the headquarters of the agency in Brasília (DF). The meeting was attended by the president of the institute, César Aldrighi; the acting president, Débora Guimarães; and the general coordinator of Environmental Management, Wilson Bonfim.

From Semas, the deputy secretary, Rodolpho Zahluth; the director of Geotechnologies and Environmental Regularization, Maximira Costa; and the advisor Luiz Cardoso were present. The director of Projects of the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ-Brazil), Taiguara Alencar, also joined the agenda.

In the meeting, all points of the work plan were discussed, and the relevance of each action between the two agencies was highlighted, considering that the construction of effective public policies for environmental conservation in the Amazon requires integrated actions between environmental and land agencies, especially regarding the regularization of agrarian reform territories. In this context, environmental regularization in Settlement Projects becomes an essential step to ensure legal security, access to public policies, and sustainability in the productive activities developed by settled families.

"It was an important day! I am happy with the progress. We will also have a meeting in Belém, between our technical teams, both those dealing with regularization and those dealing with technology, georeferencing," anticipated the president of Incra.

Aldrighi recalls that the partnership is a milestone in the resumption of the agency's environmental management activities, especially in the service of individualizing rural properties and inclusion in the Rural Environmental Registry System (Sicar). The technical cooperation also provides for the use of the new Environmental Management System in Agrarian Reform Settlements (Sigara), which is in the final stages of development by Incra.

The deputy secretary of Semas emphasizes that the agreement is the result of a joint effort by the institutions. "This agreement is the result of more than two years of partnership between Incra and the State Secretariat for the Environment of Pará. Now, with it, we consolidate the partnership that will certainly bring many results of environmental regularization in the settlements in the Amazon, with direct benefits to family farmers," highlights Rodolpho Zahluth.

Actions taken

Concurrently with the actions to build the cooperation agreement, in October 2024, the partnership promoted environmental and land regularization actions in the Settlement Projects (PA's) Olho D'Água I, in Moju; and in Calmaria II, whose area covers Moju and Acará. In the action, Semas and Incra served 167 settlers, of which 100 obtained validation of the Rural Environmental Registry (CAR) – 40 validations were carried out in lots of the Settlement Project (PA) Olho D'Água I and 60 CAR validated in PA Calmaria II.

As a result of the joint actions, the two institutions, with the technical support of German cooperation - GIZ, developed a methodological guide on environmental regularization procedures in the settlements, applied to the preparation, analysis, and rectification of CAR, which will soon be launched.

The State of Pará houses 1,207 agrarian reform settlement projects, with more than 272,000 settled families. The technical cooperation agreement reinforces the advances in the implementation of the Brazilian Forest Code in the region, especially through instruments such as CAR and the Environmental Regularization Program. The document, however, highlights the need to expand the reach of regularization, which enables access to essential public policies for the settlers.

It is noteworthy that, in 2022, the government of Pará launched the Regulariza Pará Program (Decree No. 2,745/2022), which encompasses a set of actions and instruments for the implementation of the structural component "Land, Territorial and Environmental Ordering," of the State Plan Amazon Now (PEAA). The Program is a public management instrument, which aims to promote the environmental and land regularization of rural properties, stimulate the recomposition of degraded rural areas, and encourage the maintenance of native vegetation, aiming to ensure the integrity of specially protected territorial spaces.

Still in September, technical meetings will be held in Belém, between Semas and the superintendencies of the State of Pará and the headquarters of Incra in Brasília, regarding the activities of the work plan and about the operability and integration of the platforms of the two agencies.