All About IMAZON

IMAZON, a non-profit research organization, promotes sustainable development in the Amazon region of Brazil guided by social, economic, geographic, ecological, and policy research. Founded in 1990, the Institute strives to identify policies enabling sustainable natural resource use and conservation in the Amazon supported by objective and unbiased scientific methods.

If you were walking down Rua Domingos Marreiros in Belem you would never notice the small, plain green sign hanging above the simple barred door. But once you ring the buzzer another world is opened up before your eyes. It is the world of Amazonian research. In front of each computer screen is a researcher working to understand the primary drivers of deforestation, the economic factors of beef production, the pattern of deforestation, or possible preservation policies. The Institute has about forty team members all devoted to this quest.

I feel extremely privileged to be a member of IMAZON's community for the three months I here and I absolutely love my work at Imazon! I am working with two researchers (including a Brazilian Stanford master's graduate) to identify locations suitable for reforestation projects within the municipality of Paragominas in Para State. Below is a map showing the location of Belem (the city where I am living) and Paragominas.

Twenty percent of the global carbon dioxide emissions come from deforestation… so curtailing the rate of deforestation and the reforesting devastated areas can have a large impact. The State of Para has recently pledged to plant one billion trees - this is a similar to the United Nations’s initiative to plant one billion around the world, however the twist on this project is that the one billion trees are concentrated in one State. So lots and lots of trees need to be planted and this is where my work comes in… My project’s goal is to identify locations within Paragominas eligible to receive carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism. Therefore, a developed country (only the EU, Japan, and Australia at this time) could fund a reforestation in Paragominas at a lower cost than an equivalent carbon dioxide reduction would cost in their home country. It’s all about economics!

Paragominas has witnessed over four decades of logging, ranching, and farming to become the most devastated area in the Amazon. Therefore, this municipality serves as an excellent model of how reforestation projects could be, if this project is successful, replicated elsewhere in the Para. I will also have the opportunity to travel with my research mentor to this region to see the devastation first hand.

My project will use GIS (Geographic Information Systems - computerized mapping) to identify the areas that qualify for Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects. Also, my goal is to design educational curriculum for high school and middle school science students using my work at Imazon. This part of my project will be concluded in the Fall at Cornell University.