As part of the Brazilian government’s drive to eliminate illegal deforestation caused by cattle farming, the Boi Guardião programme, launched in December 2009, is using satellite images to monitor thousands of farms in the Amazon region. More than 100 thousand farms will be covered by the end of this year.

Farms where illegal deforestation is detected will face losing their Guia de Trânsito Animal, a permit without which farmers are unable to transport their animals either to other farms or to slaughterhouses.

The Boi Guardião pilot programme already covers around 15,000 farms in the southeast of Pará, Brazil’s second-largest state. By the middle of 2011 the programme will incorporate much of the rest of Pará, along with the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso.

Boi Guardião was launched jointly by the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply, the Pará state government, the Brazilian National Development Bank (BNDES), and associations representing Brazil’s supermarkets and slaughterhouses.

The rate of Amazon deforestation is the lowest for more than 20 years, according to the latest figures, and Brazil has made a formal commitment to reducing deforestation by 80% (in comparison with the average figure between 1996 and 2005) by 2020.

Source: Office of the President and Embassy of Brazil in London