JBS Fund and Basa sign agreement for credit to small producers in Pará
The partnership aims to facilitate access to Pronaf Mais Alimentos credit for 1,500 family farmers, initially in the cities of Novo Repartimento, Pacajá and Anapu, located in the Transamazônica region of Pará. The expectation is to raise up to R$90 million, considering the profile of this public. In the same region, RestaurAmazônia, the largest family farming project in the Amazon, is being developed.
Since 2021, the initiative, led by the Solidaridad Foundation with the support of specialized technical assistance, has promoted territorial development and productive restoration on small properties. The focus is on the implementation of cocoa agroforests, integrated with livestock farming with rotational grazing. Over five years, the project will receive a total investment of R$25 million from the JBS Fund for the Amazon, with co-financing from the Elanco Foundation.
By COP30, the goal is to benefit 300 families from the project. The individual limit provided for in Pronaf Mais Alimentos is R$250,000, depending on the technical proposal, for pasture recovery activities, implementation of weeding and infrastructure to increase the number of animals per hectare.
The acquisition of cattle may be financed through another credit operation, with a total term of up to ten years, with rates between 3% and 6% per year. The agreement aims to encourage environmental regularization and traceability of properties through the recovery of pastures, diversification of production systems and intensification of livestock farming, seeking to promote more sustainable and productive models in conjunction with investment financing.
Through the partnership, Banco da Amazônia is committed to prioritizing the evaluation of technical proposals and the release of resources for small producers of RestaurAmazônia. In addition, the bank will provide human resources for training, conduct technical-economic analyses of producers and, together with the JBS Fund, define the most appropriate production systems to meet the specific needs of the beneficiary families.
In turn, the JBS Fund for the Amazon will continue to invest in supporting the recovery of pastures, the implementation of intensified production systems, as well as productive diversification with investment financing through Pronaf Mais Alimentos.
The director of the JBS Fund, Andrea Azevedo, points out that the agreement is an important step towards including small livestock producers in the Amazon in a low-carbon chain: “This group does not have the resources to invest in restoring pastures. Therefore, when the soil is depleted, the alternative is to open up new areas of forest. Most end up deforesting because the math doesn’t add up and, therefore, they are left out of this chain. The goal of the partnership with Basa, together with the RestaurAmazônia project, is to overcome this economic barrier, making the property more productive and profitable in the medium and long term, in addition to engaging producers in forest conservation, making them independent and self-sustainable. ”
The president of Banco da Amazônia, Luiz Lessa, recalls that the seed of the partnership was planted at COP28 in Dubai: "In one year, we discussed how we could work together to promote family farming and develop projects so that small agricultural and livestock producers could have access to technology and technical assistance to improve productivity in a sustainable way. We celebrated the consolidation of work that began a year ago and we will celebrate, at COP30 in Belém, a project that changes the lives of people in the Amazon".
Productive restoration model
From 2017 to 2023, 5% of settlements, which represented only 8% of the biome, were responsible for 65% of deforestation in settled areas and 17% of vegetation loss in the Amazon. The data, presented in an October study by CPI/PUC-Rio and the Amazônia 2030 project, suggest that deforestation is influenced by external factors and broader dynamics, which affect the opening of areas both inside and outside these regions.
The Superintendence of Southern Pará, which covers 505 settlements, accounts for 55% of deforestation in just 25 of them. Furthermore, 35% of forest loss in the region is concentrated in four Settlement Projects (PAs): PA Tuerê, PA Rio Cururuí, PA Rio Gelado and PA Pombal. On the banks of the Trans-Amazonian Highway, a region historically marked by deforestation, small producers face challenges such as a lack of specialized technical assistance, low productivity and limited access to credit. These factors increase pressure on the forest, driving the expansion of deforested areas.
RestaurAmazônia includes families in these critical areas in a sustainability agenda. Since 2021, the project has involved almost 1,200 families from Novo Repartimento, Anapu and Pacajá. To date, 44 thousand hectares of land are under good practices. More than a thousand hectares of Agroforestry Systems have been implemented and there has been a 47% increase in family income.
According to Paulo Lima, Cocoa and Livestock Manager at the Solidaridad Foundation, the project has managed to engage families in forest conservation. “With technical assistance, Tuerê, in Novo Repartimento, one of the largest rural settlements in Latin America, for example, has emerged from a history of degradation to become a global producer of fine cocoa ,” he says.
For Lima, access to credit is a crucial factor in strengthening actions in the region. "Through credit, producers can invest in the transition to more sustainable production models. Pronaf is one of the most relevant credit lines, as it is public in nature and offers conditions that are more suited to the needs of farming families. However, there are challenges to be overcome, such as the compliance criteria required by the financial institutions that operate the program, which require proof of land ownership and the need for guarantors. With this partnership, we hope to simplify this process", he said.
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