A proposal of economic valuation of environmental damages against the flora

Abstract

The environment is considered a diffuse good connected to the interests of the collectivity. Therefore, the Federal Constitution of Brazil provides for the principle to repair the whole environment damage, which can be defined as negative changes in natural resources that adversely affect man or nature. In these cases it is necessary a valuation of environmental damage in order to define the benefits of ecosystems that have been changed and reparation processes. This work aimed to manufacture a simple and direct method of valuation on damages committed against the flora in RS. This research was guided by Federal Decree 6514/2008 and the Replacement Cost Method, had as its starting point the extraction of major environmental damages committed in the northwest of the state. Indices were also used to make references of successional stages of vegetation, extracted from CONAMA Resolution 033/2004, reporting units in accordance with legal protection of areas, of continuous Forest Inventory informations of RS and research with companies and agencies of the sector about prices were also used of forest resources in the forest market and the costs of a project to restore the degraded area. The method for calculating the valuation of environmental damage committed against flora made from this information can be expressed as the initial value of the damage multiplied by the reporting unit and the successional stage of the vegetation over the replacement Cost of a project in the respective area. We conclude that this method is applicable to the demand of DBIO/SEMA and other environmental agencies.