MAP-FIRE: Multi-Actor Adaptation Plan to cope with Forests under Increasing Risk of Extensive fires (SGP-HW 016)

 

 

Project information

Principal investigator (PI):
Liana Oighenstein Anderson, National Centre for Monitoring and Early Warning of Natural Disasters - Cemaden, São Paulo, Brazil.
Contact - Email: liana.anderson@cemaden.gov.br, Tel: (+55) 12 3205-0154.
Duration & amount:
(June 2019 - 2022) USD 199,472
Participating countries:
Bolivia, Brazil, Perú
Project brief: Strengthening Adaptation for Amazon Wildfires

Executive summary Results Outreach Investigators Students

Executive Summary

In 2017 the United Nations recognized in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Report that progress towards sustainable development must happen at a faster rate if we aim to meet the global goals of ending poverty, with strategies addressing economic growth, education, health, social protection, and job opportunities, while tackling climate change and environmental protection. The contribution of tropical nations to the SDGs pass necessarily through the development of sustainable mechanisms to minimize the negative impacts of land use and land cover change (LULCC).

LULCC is perhaps the most complex problem for these nations to resolve. Together with deforestation, wildfires, caused by the interaction of social and climate systems are currently a major driver of reduction of Amazonian carbon stocks and biodiversity, as well as an important threat to the well-being of the ~25 million Amazonian inhabitants. Most Earth System Models predict increasing occurrence and intensity of droughts in the Amazon during the 21st century. Based on these estimates, we anticipate that future climate-land cover arrangement can enhance the direct negative impacts of wildfires on ecosystems services, by degrading forests and altering carbon and water cycles and impacting biodiversity and human well-being. We therefore expect a collapse of the resilience of Amazonian ecosystems, and a consequent loss of their capacity to fully provide ecosystem services, with an increased risk of economic and human health failure. These fire-related socio-environmental disasters were particularly critical in the Amazonian states of Madre de Dios (Peru), Acre (Brazil) and Pando (Bolivia), known as MAP, the focal region of our proposal. Minimizing the impacts of these potentially ascending socio-environmental transbordering problems in Amazonia is the first step for adapting to a changing climate in the region.

Considering that future fire occurrence is a major threat to ecosystems, its inhabitants, and international commitments of Amazonian countries for achieving sustainable futures and reducing CO2 emissions, this proposal aims to: 1) develop a comprehensive understanding of current and future fire probability as well as quantifying fire impacts in the Amazon basin; 2) produce a diagnostic and identify challenges and bottlenecks of operational and community-based strategies of fire monitoring and prevention routines for wildfire risk management in the MAP region; 3) contribute towards the increase of risk awareness and capacity/resilience of populations; and 4) influence conservation strategies and policies at the basin-wide and MAP region, by standardizing the terminology among actors, identifying actors of change and streams of information flow for policy changing and providing technical reports for governments in the Amazon region. The four outcomes are interlinked and aim to strengthen the science-police-citizen interface. The proposed transdisciplinary aims and consequent production of results will provide the first comprehensive benchmark for interpreting impacts and proposing plausible solutions to mitigate Amazonian wildfires. Information generated during this project will not only support local populations improving human well-being, but also subsidize nations with critical information for risk-informed decision making, complying with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. Moreover, our project will contribute to efforts set at the 2015 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change –Convention of the Parties 21 (CoP21) that called nations to combating climate change and adapting to its impacts. Signatory countries, including MAP countries, are required to present emission reduction plans named “Nationally Determined Contributions” (NDCs), for which our project can provide critical information. Results from this proposal will be critical for policymakers to strengthen the efforts of effectively limiting carbon emissions from tropical forest fires in the years ahead. This project, therefore, brings key information for nations to prepare for urgent actions aiming to mitigate the potential increase of fire emissions in response to the intensification of droughts in tropical ecosystems.

Results

 
Keywords: fires, economic loss, health, migration, air quality, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru
 
• The research team developed a new methodology to estimate economic losses due to fires. For Acre state in Brazil, they estimated that during the extreme dry year of 2010, fires caused an economic loss of approximately US$ 243.36±85.05 million, and from 2008 to 2012, the total amount sums US$ 307.46±85.41 million. These values represent 7.03±2.45% and 9.07±2.46% of Acre’s gross domestic product (GDP). The results have been published in Remote Sensing (Campanharo et al., 2019).
 
Related publications:
 
Book Chapter:
 
Bilbao, B., L. Steil, I.R. Urbieta, L. Anderson, C. Pinto, M.E. Gonzalez, A. Millán, R.M. Falleiro, E. Morici, V. Ibarnegaray, D.R. Pérez-Salicrup, J.M. Pereira y J.M. Moreno 2020: Incendios forestales. En: Adaptación frente a los riesgos del cambio climático en los países iberoamericanos – Informe RIOCCADAPT [Moreno, J.M., C. Laguna-Defi or, V. Barros, E. Calvo Buendía, J.A. Marengo y U. Oswald Spring (eds.)]. McGraw-Hill, Madrid, España (pp. 459-524, ISBN: 9788448621643). 
 
• The team, in collaboration with the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development Acre-Queimadas project, released three reports link to reports on air quality,  burned areas, fires and COVID-19 in the State of Acre, Brazil, in the Southwestern Amazon:
 
 
 
 
• Project investigators analyzed data from 30 air quality sensors in 22 municipalities in the State of Acre. Their results show that in 2019, there were 21 days in Acre when air pollution levels exceeded the daily maximum limit recommended by the World Health Organization. The poor air quality was associated with the 2019 fires, which burned an area of 1,802 km2, an area 80% greater than that burned in 2018 in Acre.
 
• Project findings point to an increase in the population exposure to fires based on an analysis of data from 1998 and 2016. Population migration to urban centers and the increase in the population in the southern of Acre state, lead to an increase of more than 80 thousand people in areas where there is a predominance of low air quality, as defined by the World Health Organization, due to fire occurrence. The complete results of this study have been accepted in the Brazilian Journal Saúde em Debate (Anderson and Marchezini, 2020, accepted) and will soon be available in Portuguese to facilitate the information dissemination to environmental and health governmental organizations stakeholders.
 
• The team has also produced a technical report to inform decision makers about Brazil’s Challenge to Restrain Deforestation and Fires in the Amazon during the COVID-19 Pandemic in 2020: Environmental, social implication and their governance. This report is available in Portuguese and English.
 
 
• A webinar Public Ministry and Environmental Secretariat of Acre State was organized and held in June 2020 to disseminate the findings of the reports:
 
• During the year 2019, the team has investigated the area of Madre de Dios (Peru), Acre (Brazil) and Pando (Bolivia), known as MAP-Fire region, and developed an online platform to subsidize the monitoring of fire occurrences. This tool supported the planning and decisions by the project stakeholders during the 2019 fire crises in the Amazon. This Platform combines the near real-time fire occurrence (time and location) integrated with other spatial information, such as roads, land use, schools, health centers, etc., and provides alerts on areas with higher fires occurrence. This type of information was not available at the time, in near real time, and automatically updated for the tri-national frontier. The Platform can be accessed via: http://terrama.cemaden.gov.br/griif/mapfire/monitor/
 
• Two capacity building events have been held associated with this Platform: 
 
1. Workshop Queimadas na Amazônia Sul-Ocidental, on the 16th and 18th June, with more than 640 and 400 views on Youtube, in each date, respectivel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sW5YYkCiYI&t=114s
 
2. Workshop organized by the Universidad Autônoma de Pando (Bolivia), attended by over 280 people on 20 July 2020, webcast live on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/324033628236405/posts/617962032176895/
 
• The team found that wildfires contingency plans for normal climate years are ineffective, and most recently fires are increasing the importance of climate as a negative impact driver. Moreover, researchers found that during extreme droughts, forests become more vulnerable and there is an increase in its fire affected areas.
 
• The MAP-Fire project team with the teachers Alex Pimentel (Arts) and Elisa Wander (Geography) have implemented one elective discipline at the Instituto de Educação Lourenço Filho, Rio Branco, Acre, Brazil. The course combines Geography and Arts to promote scientific methodologies to understand and diagnose the risk of wildfires and impacts in the students’ lives and their region. Currently, there are another three public schools in Acre which aims to join the project activities. The MAP-FIRE team is developing an “Activities Handbook” and a “Theoretical Background book” for teachers, in order to provide material and information for bringing the Wildfire Risks and Impacts topics to secondary public schools in Amazonia.
 
• In addition to the MAP-FIRE Platform, the team also developed a website with air quality information to guide decision making in Acre: http://www.acrequalidadedoar.info/ 
 
• The team organized the online Workshop “Queimadas na Amazônia Sul-Ocidental” from 15-19 July 2020. The workshop had 22 presentations and over 800 participants, with 1,000 views online each day. All the talks had translation to the Brazilian Sign Language (Libras) aimed to make the information as accessible as possible. All the presentations can be accessed via: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLSclSgJ2G16AGc4KZb2-5g
 

Report on fires (in Portuguese)

Report on air quality (in Portuguese).pdf

http://www.iai.int/en/post/detail/IAI-project-measures-in-situ-the-impacts-on-air-quality-in-the-Southwestern-Amazon

Outreach

Project website

https://www.treeslab.org/map-fire.html

Project website on ResearchGate
https://www.researchgate.net/project/MAP-Fire-Multi-Actor-Adaptation-Plan-to-cope-with- Forests-under-Increasing-Risk-of-Extensive-fires

Infographics

Spanish

Portuguese

Engilsh

Newspapers

Além de começar com A, o que Austrália e Amazônia têm em comum? Fogo, fumaça e perda da biodiversidade
https://agazetadoacre.com/alem-de-comecar-com-a-o-que- australia-e-amazonia-tem-em-comum-fogo-fumaca-e-perda-da-biodiversidade/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2020

Boas notícias no mundo e por que elas importam 
https://agazetadoacre.com/boas-noticias-no-mundo-e-por-que-elas-importam/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2020

Desmatamento na Amazônia afeta as chuvas? Sim. A pergunta mais importante: Quanto?
https://agazetadoacre.com/desmatamento-na-amazonia-afeta-as-chuvas-sim-a-pergunta-mais- importante-quanto/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

Para pensar em desenvolvimento na Amazônia precisamos falar de clima 
https://agazetadoacre.com/para-pensar-em-desenvolvimento-na-amazonia-precisamos-falar- de-clima/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

Muito calor? O caso curioso de temperatura no ambiente e sua relação ao desmatamento
https://agazetadoacre.com/muito-calor-o-caso-curioso-de-temperatura-no-ambiente-e-sua- relacao-ao-desmatamento/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

Quem disse que a influência humana está afetando o clima? 
https://agazetadoacre.com/quem-disse-que-a-influencia-humana-esta-afetando-o-clima-2/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

Se a mensagem não agrada, mata-se o mensageiro e outras falácias ad hominem sobre desmatamento na Amazônia
https://agazetadoacre.com/se-a-mensagem-nao-agrada-mata-se-o-mensageiro-e-outras- falacias-ad-hominem-sobre-desmatamento-na-amazonia/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019


Secas e inundações: construindo soluções globais na nossa região 
https://agazetadoacre.com/537891-2/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

Um sistema que não prepara a próxima geração para sobreviver é um sistema falido
https://agazetadoacre.com/um-sistema-que-nao-prepara-a-proxima-geracao-para-sobreviver-e- um-sistema-falido-2/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

O que está acontecendo com o clima da Amazônia? 
https://agazetadoacre.com/o-que-esta-acontecendo-com-o-clima-da-amazonia/
A GAZETA, Brazil, 2019

2019 Amazon fire crisis media coverage

https://www.ovale.com.br/_conteudo/_conteudo/nossa_regiao/2019/06/80300-dados-do-inpe-em basam--cruzada--de-especialistas-contra-aquecimento-global.html 
Website post, 2019

http://programatrocandoemmiudos.com.br/pt-br/node/2402 
EURONEWS, 2019

https://es.euronews.com/2019/08/21/los-incendios-en-el-amazonas-aumentan-un-82-en-comparacion-con-el-mismo-periodo-de-2018
San Diego Union Tribune, 2019

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/en- espanol/noticias/mundo/articulo/2019-08-27/los-cientificos-del-clima-temen-que-este-llegando-a- un-punto-critico
World news, 2019

https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2019-08-25/amazon-rainforest-fires-climate
LA Times, 2019

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07lxs8j
BBC World news, 2019

https://deutsch.rt.com/amerika/91550- amazonas/ 
Deutsch RT, 2019

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3csym24 
BBC World news, 2019

2019 Amazon fire crisis media coverage
https://novaator.err.ee/974203/brasiilia-teadlased-amzonas-poleb-inimeste-tottu

Government websites

Pesquisadores do Cemaden desenvolvem um sistema para monitorar o risco de incêndios florestais na Amazônia
https://www.cemaden.gov.br/pesquisadores-do-cemaden-desenvolvem-um-sistema-para- monitorar-risco-de-incendios-florestais-na-amazonia/
Government website, 2019

Plataforma de monitoramento identifica imóveis rurais, áreas protegidas e acesso aos focos de queimadas e incêndios florestais da Amazônia
https://www.cemaden.gov.br/plataforma-de-monitoramento-identificara-imoveis-rurais-areas- protegidas-e-acesso-aos-focos-de-queimadas-e-incendios-florestais-da-amazonia/
Government website, 2019

MAP-Fire platform post on Mundo Geo website
https://mundogeo.com/2019/10/04/plataforma-identifica-imoveis-areas-protegidas-e-acesso-a- focos-de-queimadas-na-amazonia/

Cemaden participará do Science Days 2019, mostrando as tecnologias voltadas ao monitoramento e prevenção de desastres
http://www.cemaden.gov.br/cemaden-participara-do-science-days-2019-mostrando-as- tecnologias-voltadas-ao-monitoramento-e-prevencao-de-desastres/
Government website, 2019

Estudos sobre impactos dos incêndios florestais estimam perda acumulada no Acre, em cinco anos, de cerca de R$ 981 milhões
http://www.cemaden.gov.br/estudos-sobre-impactos-dos-incendios-florestais-estimam-perda- acumulada-no-acre-em-cinco-anos-de-cerca-de-r-981-milhoes/
Website post, 2019

Relatório dos cientistas mundiais sobre emergência climática tem participação de pesquisadores do Cemaden
http://www.cemaden.gov.br/relatorio-dos-cientistas-mundiais-sobre-emergencia-climatica-tem- participacao-de-pesquisadores-do-cemaden/
Project Website, 2019

 

Investigators

Principal Investigator

Brazil:

Liana Oighenstein Anderson, National Centre for Monitoring and Early Warning of Natural Disasters - Cemaden
E-mail: liana.anderson@cemaden.gov.br

Co-Principal Investigators (co-PI)

Brazil

Luiz Eduardo O. C. de Aragão, National Institute for Space Research - INPE
luiz.aragao@inpe.br

Victor Marchezini, National Centre for Monitoring and Early Warning of Natural Disasters - Cemaden
victor.marchezini@cemaden.gov.br

Sonaira Silva, Federal University of Acre (UFAC), campus Cruzeiro do Sul.
sonairasilva@gmail.com

Bolivia

Guillermo Rioja-Ballivian, HERENCIA
guillermorioja@gmail.com

Galia Selay, HERENCIA
gselaya@outlook.com

Peru

César Ascorr, Asociación CINCIA
ascorrcf@wfu.edu

Students