Degraded pastures in Brazil: improving livestock production and forest restoration

Abstract

Degraded pasture is a major liability in Brazilian agriculture, but restoration and recovery efforts could turn this area into a new frontier to both agricultural yield expansion and forest restoration. Currently, rural properties with larger degraded pasture areas are associated with higher levels of technical inefficiency in Brazil. The recovery of 12 million ha of degraded pastures could generate an additional production of 17.7 million bovines while reducing the need for new agricultural land. Regional identification of degraded pastures would facilitate the targeting of agricultural extension and advisory services and rural credit efforts aimed at fostering pasture recovery. Since only 1% of Brazilian municipalities contain 25% of degraded pastures, focusing pasture recovery efforts on this small group of municipalities could generate considerable benefits. More efficient allocation of degraded and native pastures for meat production and forest restoration could provide land enough to fully comply with its Forest Code requirements, while adding 9 million heads to the cattle inventory. Degraded pasture recovery and restoration is a win-win strategy that could boost livestock husbandry and avoid deforestation in Brazil and has to be the priority strategy of agribusiness sector.

Keywords: Brazil; degraded pasturelands; livestock efficiency; rural credit.

Figure 1.

Brazilian regions. Amazon (AMZ), Matopiba Cerrado (MTP), Caatinga (CAA), Eastern Atlantic Forest (EAF), Pantanal (PTN), Centre-Southern Cerrado (CSC), Southern Atlantic Forest (SAF) and Pampa (PMP).

Figure 2.

Stocking rates estimated for pasture according to regions, using spatial regression models (see electronic supplementary material for details). Stocking rates are measured as additional head per additional hectare of degraded, native and planted pasture. Amazon (AMZ), Matopiba Cerrado (MTP), Caatinga (CAA). Eastern Atlantic Forest (EAF), Pantanal (PTN), Center-Southern Cerrado (CSC), Southern Atlantic Forest (SAF) and Pampa (PMP). PTN region does not have enough observations (municipalities) and was not estimated.

Figure 3.

Degraded pastures on cattle farms by municipalities (spots). (a) The 15 municipalities with the largest area of degraded pastures hold together 1 Mha of degraded pastures and can potentially add 1.4 million heads, (b) the 42 municipalities that hold together 2 Mha could add 2.79 million heads, and (c) the 83 municipalities that hold together 3 Mha could add 4.02 million heads. Spots have been enlarged for better viewing.

Figure 4.

Credit programmes and their respective fund sources applied for pasture recovery in Brazil (pasture, tillage, soil fertilization, soil correction and soil protection in livestock activities). Values are total from January 2013 and April 2021, deflated by the National Consumer Price Index (INPC), in US$ million. Programmes are: Low Carbon Agriculture (ABC), National Program for Family Farming (Pronaf), National Program for Medium Sized Producers (Pronamp). Single credits not linked with specific programmes (NOP) and nine other smaller programmes together (all others). Fund sources are: Brazilian Development Bank/Finame with subsidized credit (BNDES-S), Rural Savings with restricted interest rates (RS-R), Rural Savings with unrestricted interest rates (RS-U), Center Western Constitutional Fund (FCO), Northeastern Constitutional Fund (FNE), Northern Constitutional Fund (FNO), Compulsory Resources from checking deposits reserves (CR), Hybrid Capital Debit Instrument (IHDI) and all other sources as unrestricted resources (All others).