RESEX Soure Leading Innovative Management and Traditional Knowledge to Combat Threatened Biodiversity

Extractive Reserves are catered for in IUCN’s Protected Area categories, represented in Category VI: Protected area with sustainable use of natural resources. In Brazil, these reserves were created to protect the territorial rights of traditional and local communities, ensuring their livelihoods and subsistence activities while preserving biodiversity. These communities practice sustainable extractivism and natural resource use that does not harm the environment.

RESEX Soure was the first marine extractive reserve in Pará, paving the way for 13 more reserves. More than 1200 families live in the Reserve and rely on sustainable fishing for their livelihood, with the main activity being the fishing and commercialisation of the mangrove crab, a key-species that is a bioindicator for the state of conservation of the mangroves.

The Reserve stands out for its co-management model, shared between ICMBio and ASSUREMAS, an association of users and beneficiaries of the area. It has a strong deliberative council, with 14 other associations of local communities, NGO’s, universities and government bodies, that alongside ICMBio have been implementing ground-breaking participatory management activities.

Located on the world's biggest fluvio-marine island in the Amazon basin estuary, the rich interactions between the Amazon forest and the sea create a unique mosaic of diversity of species that occur in the region. Soure is also rich in cultural heritage, with local gastronomy, artisanal fishing practices, rhythms and dances, ceramics, traditional medicine with oils and herbs and rites, festivities, storytelling and local legends that are practiced and preserved by local communities.

The area first started on its path towards the Green List in 2022, in the scope of the Green List Amazon project, supported by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, alongside 20 other areas. Soure was the first to Brazilian site to obtain the certification. Participating in the Green List process, RESEX Soure was selected for the implementation of Tech4Nature, a global initiative from IUCN and Huawei, implemented locally by Rare, ICMBio, the Federal University of Pará and ASSUREMAS, that aims to develop low-cost technology to strengthen conservation efforts, monitor the effects of climate change in the region and monitor the key-species of Soure, the mangrove crab.

RESEX Soure’s Panorama Solution, Valuing protected areas through scientific and traditional knowledge | PANORAMA, illustrates the communities’ participation and leadership in the area’s management. The second Research Seminar of the RESEX marked a significant milestone for the Tech4Nature project, coinciding with the reserve's 23rd anniversary. The equipment developed by the University of Pará to measure climate change’s effects in the area’s estuary will be installed, with promising results to monitor weather and ocean alterations, supporting decision-making for mitigation and adaptation actions for Soure.

The Tech4Nature Phase 2 project for Marajó Island in Pará, Brazil, aims to develop a solution to measure water levels and temperature, helping to understand the impact of climate change on the mangrove ecosystem. Additionally, the project will monitor the local mangrove crab population to determine if its decline is due to fishing, subsistence activities, or environmental factors.