Infrastructure projects could cut costs, raise Amazon risks
Gustavo Pinto
Divulgação/CPI/PUC-Rio
A group of large transportation infrastructure projects under construction in the Amazon could cut logistics costs, expand market access, and transform the economic landscape of about 300 municipalities in Brazil’s North and Central-West regions. But their effects could extend far beyond the highway and railway corridors, reaching remote areas where preserved forest, insecure land tenure, and limited government presence increase the risk of deforestation and the spread of illegal activities.
The scenarios are outlined in a new study by the public policy and climate finance research center Climate Policy Initiative (CPI/PUC-Rio) and Amazônia 2030, an initiative focused on formulating public policies for sustainable development in the region.
The study analyzes four projects under construction: the modernization of the BR-364 highway in Rondônia, covering 687 kilometers; the paving of the middle section of the BR-319 highway between Porto Velho and Manaus, spanning 339 kilometers; the 743-kilometer Mato Grosso State Railway; and the first 383-kilometer section of the Central-West Integration Railway (FICO), between Mara Rosa, Goiás, and Água Boa, Mato Grosso.
Together, the projects represent a structural shift in the region’s connectivity, bringing producers closer to consumer markets and reducing transportation costs. Researchers warn, however, that their economic and environmental effects are likely to spread across a much larger area than the corridors the projects directly occupy.
To measure their reach, the study uses a market-access methodology employed in economics to estimate how infrastructure improvements alter transportation costs and a region’s economic incentives.
Rather than limiting the analysis to areas around the projects, the model identifies which municipalities will gain better conditions for selling output and buying inputs once the new routes begin operating. It reveals indirect effects that could reach places tens or even hundreds of kilometers away.
The study identified 44.7 million hectares of public forests without formal designation within the projects’ areas of influence. That is equivalent to the combined area of São Paulo and Paraná.
According to the researchers, the lack of clearly defined land tenure encourages land grabbing, illegal deforestation, and criminal organizations. The greatest risks are concentrated in Amazonas, particularly in municipalities such as Coari, Manicoré, and Canutama, where improved accessibility coincides with extensive forest cover and a limited government presence.
“The effects of a major project do not end where the highway or railway ends. By reducing transportation costs, it changes the region’s economic structure, expands producers’ access to new markets, and creates incentives that can alter land use far beyond the project’s route. It is precisely this area of indirect influence that must be incorporated into planning and mitigation measures,” said Gustavo Pinto, CPI research manager and professor in the Department of Economics at PUC-Rio.
The objective is not to automatically link infrastructure with deforestation, but to show that risks can be anticipated and reduced when considered from the planning stage. “By identifying the most vulnerable municipalities in advance, the government can direct land-use planning, formally designate public lands, strengthen enforcement, and combat illegal activities before the impacts take hold. Infrastructure should promote development, not create conditions in which its benefits are erased by environmental losses and the expansion of criminal activity,” Pinto stressed.
The authors believe that restricting mitigation measures to the corridors directly affected by the projects tends to underestimate their effects. Because the projects complement one another, implementing them together expands the reach of the economic changes and requires an integrated view of the region. The study recommends pairing transportation decisions with policies on land-use planning, environmental conservation, and stronger government presence.
The Ministry of Transportation highlighted measures included in the 2024-2035 Climate Plan aimed at adapting transportation infrastructure to extreme weather events and reducing the sector’s emissions. The ministry did not explain, however, how its project planning incorporates a broader territorial area of influence that accounts for possible indirect effects on land use and pressure on public lands.
Infra S.A., a state-owned company affiliated with the ministry that structures projects for the federal government, said its environmental and feasibility studies consider directly affected areas as well as areas of direct and indirect influence, defined according to the impacts identified in the Environmental Impact Assessment and Environmental Impact Report (EIA/Rima) and the terms of reference issued by Brazil’s environmental protection agency, Ibama, and other agencies. The company acknowledged, however, that infrastructure planning in the Amazon “lacks a strategic environmental assessment” and argued that projects should be coordinated with policies on land-use planning, environmental management, land-tenure regularization, enforcement, and monitoring. Ibama did not respond to a request for comment.
Translation: Todd Harkin
