Brazil has cut Amazon deforestation by between 60 and 80 per cent over two decades, but four of the country’s flagship supply chain policies have failed to halt forest degradation, the slower and less visible assault now hollowing the canopy from beneath. That is according to lead author Federico Cammelli at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Geography and Conservation Research Institute, whose findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, warn that the European Union’s Deforestation Regulation defines degradation too narrowly to capture the fire damage, illegal logging and fragmentation tied to soybean and beef production across the basin.
Wood Central understands the four policies tested, including the Amazon Soy Moratorium and the G4 cattle agreement signed by Brazil’s four largest meat packers, were assessed against degradation indicators across three Brazilian states, with the research team finding none had measurably reduced the fires, illegal logging and habitat fragmentation now driving the canopy collapse from underneath. Earlier work cited in the PNAS paper found net carbon emissions from forest degradation in the Brazilian Amazon between 2001 and 2018 ran comparable to, or higher than, those from outright deforestation.
The first phase of Brazil’s Plan for Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Amazon, launched in the mid-2000s, drove a 60-to-80-per-cent reduction in tree clearing, with private-sector commitments including the soy moratorium and the G4 cattle commitment from Brazil’s largest meat packers contributing to the regional success. Despite those gains, the Cambridge-led team found no conclusive evidence that supply chain policies had tackled the fire damage and illegal logging that drive anthropogenic degradation across the Amazon basin.
The Cambridge team described degraded landscapes now extending across millions of hectares of Brazilian Amazon, where low-intensity fires creep under the canopy until the trees die standing: “There’s still a forest there, but it’s so damaged that the carbon it once stored starts leaking, the animals have disappeared, and new grass species colonize the forest edges,” Cammelli said.
“Flames often go undetected under the canopy, but after one or two years, trees die while standing, and the forest transforms into a cemetery of dead standing trees.”
The G4 cattle agreement, signed by Brazil’s four biggest meatpackers, appeared to be linked to an increase in Amazon timber extraction, possibly because tighter regulation of cattle ranching pushed some operators into the less-regulated logging sector. The Cambridge team described the displacement effect as a clear illustration of how single-commodity policies can shift environmental pressure between sectors of the rural economy rather than removing it from the landscape.
“Avoiding deforestation and degradation is so much more important for climate and nature than restoring what’s already gone,” said senior author Professor Rachael Garrett of Cambridge’s Department of Geography and Conservation Research Institute. “There are certain things you can’t get back.”
The Cambridge team is urging Brussels to broaden the EUDR’s definition of degradation, which the researchers argue currently overlooks the fire damage and fragmentation tied to soybean and beef production, leaving operators able to comply with the regulation while sourcing from forests still hollowed out by fire and illegal logging [INSERT BACKLINK to Wood Central EUDR explainer or A-EU FTA coverage]. Despite Brazil’s 2023 environmental policy update, which introduced degradation into its enforcement criteria for municipalities with poor records, the Cambridge team found no publicly documented examples of companies operating in the Brazilian Amazon that had set concrete corporate targets specifically addressing degradation.
On the ground in the Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve, firefighter Antonio, who has worked the Amazon fire lines since 2019, said 2024 marked the most extreme fire year of his career, with the dry season lengthening each year and the rains arriving with sudden violence when they finally came. “I had never seen anything like it. The forest burned like dry pasture—it was frightening for those of us who risk our lives to protect it,” Antonio said.
By 2050, on the Cambridge team’s projection, forest degradation could span the entirety of the Brazilian Amazon — leaving Brazil’s flagship soy moratorium and G4 cattle pact short of the fires and illegal logging now hollowing the canopy beneath them.
For more information: F. Cammelli, R. Garrett et al., Deforestation-focused policies do not reduce degradation in the Brazilian Amazon, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2026). DOI: 10.1073/pnas2507793123
