Qualla: Bom Futuro National Forest

Bom Futuro National Forest: Introduction

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. By 2003, the town had shops, a gas station, a hotel, and telephone service. It also had more than ten sawmills. Rio Pardo was not supposed to exist — it had been built inside the Bom Futuro National Forest, a federally protected reserve in Rondônia. Loggers arrived first, around the year 2000. Squatters and land speculators followed. Local politicians provided cover. And IBAMA, the federal environmental agency charged with protecting the forest, tried twice to expel the invaders and failed both times, in part because its own headquarters would not fund the operation. The name "Bom Futuro" means "good future." The irony has not softened with time.

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Bom Futuro National Forest: What the Forest Once Was

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. Created by federal decree in June 1988, the Bom Futuro National Forest originally encompassed an estimated 280,000 hectares in the municipalities of Buritis and Porto Velho. As recently as 1995 it was relatively intact. The original vegetation was a layered mosaic: open submontan...

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Bom Futuro National Forest: A Town That Should Not Exist

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. The invasion began around 2000 with loggers cutting roads into the forest. Associations formed to promote the allocation of cleared land to farmers and ranchers. Within a few years, the settlement of Rio Pardo had coalesced along the road connecting to the BR-364 highway, complet...

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Bom Futuro National Forest: The Forest Shrinks to Fit the Crime

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. In July 2009, the federal government created a working group to address the social and environmental crisis inside Bom Futuro. By September, national public security forces were authorized to support IBAMA in curbing deforestation. But the most dramatic response came in June 2010...

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Bom Futuro National Forest: Administered but Not Saved

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. Bom Futuro is administered by the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation, or ICMBio, the agency named for the rubber tapper and environmental activist murdered in 1988 — the same year the forest was created. It is classified as IUCN category VI, a protected area per...

Image: Brazil_location_map.svg: NordNordWest derivative work: Виктор В (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0