IPAM (Amazon Environmental Research Institute) considers the reduction in deforestation in the Amazon and Cerrado by 2025 to be positive, but says that the development model needs to change to avoid a return to forest loss. The data was released on Thursday (30) by Prodes, from INPE (National Institute for Space Research).
Between August 2024 and July 2025, the Amazon saw a drop in deforestation of 11.08% (5,796 km²) compared to the same period last year. This is the third lowest rate in the historical series, which began in 1988.
In the Cerrado, the drop in deforestation for the period was 11.49% (7,235.27 km²). According to the agency, the emission of 733.9 million tons of CO2e due to deforestation in the Amazon and Cerrado has been avoided since 2022.
For IPAM, the results reflect a collective effort between the government, civil society, as well as traditional peoples and communities, especially on the eve of the COP30 Climate Conference in Brazil; but it reinforces the need to maintain efforts to combat deforestation.
“We’ve seen deforestation fall dramatically at other times and then rise again. That’s why we must be vigilant and join forces so that this doesn’t happen again. It is imperative to expand and maintain command and control actions, but it is also key to invest in the development of more sustainable production models, which presuppose standing forests, as well as systems that pay for the ecosystem services that native vegetation provides. Only in this way will deforestation become a thing of the past,” says André Guimarães, executive director of IPAM.
“The fall in deforestation shows that, when the government wants to, it can protect the forest and reduce its emissions. The challenge now is to turn this result into a permanent state commitment, regardless of political cycles. It’s also essential to go beyond clear-cutting and reduce fire and degradation, because it’s not enough to keep the forest standing, you have to keep it alive,” says Ane Alencar, IPAM’s Science Director.