Southern Amazonas – Northern Rondônia, Brazil

The Workshop on “Governance of Protected Areas and Infrastructure Development in Southern Amazonas / Northern Rondônia: Reflections, Lessons and New Directions,” was held on July 23-25, 2019, at Candeias do Jamari, Rondônia – Brazil. It was organized and facilitated by UF and IEB (Instituto Internacional de Educação do Brasil), in partnership with WWF-Brazil and IDESAM (Institute of Conservation and Sustainable Development of the Amazon).

The Workshop goals were to:

Exchange experiences for reflection and learning about the strategies and tools used by participants to promote governance of protected areas and regional infrastructure development;
Explore opportunities for collaboration on strategic actions and research projects to strengthen governance and regional socio-environmental development; and
Initiate a Community of Practice and Learning (CoP-L) among different stakeholders working on governance of protected areas and infrastructure.

A set of guiding questions was used to help focus the discussions on three core topics throughout the workshop:

Governance: How are decisions made and by whom? Which driving factors have influenced or are influencing significant change on these socio-ecological systems?
Efficacy: What strategies and tools are being used? What is working or not? Lessons learned? and
Community of Practice and Learning: How can we strengthen our strategies and work as a group?

The workshop included 35 participants from universities, NGOs, grassroots and indigenous organizations, and state and local government and had a dynamic and participatory methodology that included the following interconnected activities:

Ten thematic presentations by regional experts on cross-scalar governance, establishment and management of mosaics of protected areas, indigenous rights, social inclusion and gender, and sustainable forest and rural production systems;
Timeline and participatory mapping exercises, where participants collectively constructed and discussed a synthesis of the regional context, threats and opportunities;
An experiences exchange (feira de experiências) in which each organization presented some of their main strategies and tools, lessons learned, and challenges related to governance and infrastructure; and
Structured discussions in groups and plenary related to the workshop goals and guiding questions.

Participants have projects and actions spread throughout the whole mosaic, but key areas affected by infrastructure were highlighted:

the Madeira river, from the town of Guajará-Mirim to Manicoré;
the BR-319 and BR-230 highways;
the areas affected by major hydropower dams, like Santo Antônio and Jirau, and Tabajara (planned);
the indigenous lands between the Purus and Madeira interfluvial region and the Kawahiva indigenous corridor; and
the municipalities of Boca do Acre, Lábrea, Manicoré, Humaitá, Apui and Porto Velho.

Based on the above discussions, the Community of Practice and Learning was formed and identified the following topics for collective learning and action:

Territorial, human and indigenous rights;
Large infrastructure project policy and licensing;
Integrated management and monitoring of protected areas;
Scientific-technical collaboration; and
Training on the use of drones for monitoring of protected areas and indigenous government (with planning for a training workshop on October 30, 2019, in the town of Humaitá, in partnership with the federal and state universities of Amazonas – UFAM and UEA).