Spatial-temporal analysis of the impacts of natural vegetation replacement with crops and patures in the cerrados of Mato Grosso State

• Grant number: 11/22027-2
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: April 01, 2012
• End date: April 30, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Forestry Resources and Forestry Engineering - Nature Conservation
• Principal Investigator: Antonio Roberto Formaggio
• Grantee: Antonio Roberto Formaggio
• Host Institution: Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE). Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação (Brasil). São José dos Campos , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Ailton Luchiari ; Alfredo José Barreto Luiz ; Kleber Trabaquini ; Yosio Edemir Shimabukuro

Abstract

The proposed project fits within a broader context of unprecedented global changes in land-use and land-cover (LULC), in which the Cerrado biome plays a key role as one of the regions with the greatest expansion of cultivated lands in the past decades in the world, and at the same time, being identified as a world biodiversity hotspot. The potential environmental impacts resulting from the intensive conversion of the Cerrados in agricultural lands are numerous, but still poorly assessed, being necessary tools capable of mapping, monitoring, and synthesizing key aspects of these environmental changes and that can help in decision making. Using a multidisciplinary approach, based on the use of remote sensing, modeling, and GIS, this research will seek to understand and quantify the changes in land-se and land-cover, and to assess their influence in the loss of the environmental quality. The study area will be a watershed located in the Cerrados of Mato Grosso (Chapada dos Parecis), which has suffered an intense anthropic pressure due to agricultural expansion in the past decades. The methodology will consist of three main parts: (1) mapping and quantifying the historical LULC changes from a remote sensing dataset, (2) using environmental modelling (SWAT, USLE), within a GIS environment, to quantify of the environmental impacts of LULC changes, and (3) synthesizing the information from previous steps in key environmental indicators to be assessed within the OECD's Pressure-State-Response framework. The proposed research intends to provide espacialized estimates of environmental degradation due to LULC changes as well as recommendations that can support decision making and contribute to a more sustainable future for this important Brazilian Biome. (AU)