No wood to enable steel pole in MS

But deforestation for the production of coal continues as a shadow for business. Photo: Arquive Ecoa

The efforts of Mato Grosso do Sul in diversifying its economy with the creation of a complex of mining and steel - led by MMX (the entrepreneur Eike Batista), Rio Tinto Brazil and Vale do Rio Doce - may suffer a sharp setback. Once again, for environmental reasons.

A new study shows that the State has no stock of wood legally required to feed the blast furnace iron planned to leave the paper. Moved in large part to charcoal, these units pressure even more a reality already known in the region: the deforestation of the Pantanal, Cerrado and smuggling of wood of Paraguay and (it is suspected) of Bolivia.

Prepared by the Centre for Studies in Sustainability of the Getulio Vargas Foundation (FGV), in Sao Paulo, at the request of the environmental organization Conservation International (CI), the document warns against a backdrop of environmental unsustainability - with negative social and economic impacts - if the government local not structure.

To feed those furnaces, however, will need at least double the area of planted forests available in the State. "And there won’t be this area," warns Carvalho. After two years of study and interviews, the researcher of FGV came to the conclusion: the accounts not close. "Unless the government create a model of sustainable production of coal."

According to the study, in 2007 there were about 148 thousand hectares of planted forests in Mato Grosso do Sul - almost nothing when compared with the 490 thousand hectares of pine and eucalyptus of 70. Of this volume, 80 thousand are bound to the operation of the VCP (Votorantim Celulose and Paper) in the State. Other 39 thousand are destined for various sectors of the economy. Therefore, only 30 thousand hectares of planted forests in the state, with trees in various stages of growth.

But deforestation for the production of coal continues as a shadow for business. From January to August 2007, the Military Police of the State Environmental disclosed having closed 104 carvoarias without permission. In Paraguay, attaches itself to smugglers Brazilians, associated with coal producing plant, the responsibility for the devastation. Last year the Federal Police and Ibama have four operations on the joint border. And took much coal without proven origin. "Paraguay has forests and the steel will eat everything," says Inácio Santos, the agent from Ibama.