Agricultural frontier and threats to protected areas in Cerrado

the case of the springs of Parnaíba river national park

Abstract

Cerrado has been dealing with an intense landscape shift due to the advance of agricultural frontier. The development model adopted in Brazil since the 1960s has encouraged the conservative modernization of agriculture and has emerged the “agribusiness pact”. This pact is intensified by an ideological apparatus mechanism called agro-strategies. This coordinated set of actions has been seeking to influence governmental policies due to the increase of commodities production areas. The protected areas in Cerrado play an important role to biodiversity conservancy and against the advance of the agricultural frontier. However, the agro-strategies have inflicted threats to those territories thereby it could reduce their territorial boundaries, provoking re-categorization or even causing flexibility of their protective goals. This paper aims to discuss the agricultural frontier territorial changes in Cerrado, and how agro-strategies have been acting over the conservation territories. The case which will be analyzed is the Springs of Parnaíba river national park downsizing. This protected area is located on the borders of the states of Maranhão, Tocantins, Piauí and Bahia and one of the biggest production areas of the country.