Big Lands Brazil

Sustainable Forestry

Big Lands Brazil excels in the acquisition, set up and management of Sustainable Forestry projects for our clients. We work hard to assist our clients with sustainable forestry investments. We work in a consulting, management, project acquisition, project set up and post project set up management for our clients.

Client Investment Strategy

Big Lands Brazil has created a fund strategy for accredited investors (or equivalent), companies, and funds seeking long-term, consistent returns based on a conservative business plan in surging market of Brazil. This investment is designed as a trusted option to gain access to the emerging market of Brazil in a safe manner, truly unique in the marketplace. The investment is not designed to be creative in taking on unnecessary risk. Sustainable forestry is one of the world’s most profitable investments. The wood produced in the project has wide-ranging applications. Wood harvested from sustainable forestry has application in the wood products business. Sustainable forestry plantations are for all types of institutional and private investors.

The Big Lands Brazil Strategy:

• The investor owns all land in full either individually or through a corporate or fund structure.
• Land is purchased below market value in areas with strong expected appreciation.
• Big Lands Brazil offers high technical assistance. We have two experienced forestry engineers on contract, each specializing in setting up sustainable forestry projects in the state of Para.
• The end products are targeted to have sale agreements before investment is made. - Big Lands Brazil, works with several wood trading groups that are interested in off-take.
• In addition to the current expected return on investment, which is high. The market for the end product has room to expand 5% per year over the next 20 years. As large illegal forestry operations are phased out, certified operations will have high values and profits.
• The project brings control to the property that the project is on and the vicinity around the property allowing for preservation of the region.
• The investor has several exit options, including selling the project or selling the land.

Big Lands Brazil has worked hard to design this investment to be more competitive than the competition. The land we source for our clients has a lower price tag, the set up costs are lower and the logistics of the land location are far better than other properties in Brazil. Also, there are no other groups that are present that can set up such large scale projects for foreign investors.

Product Offering

Our Current property offering ranges from 8,000 hectares to 300,000 hectares.

We also have access to government concessions that range from a few hundred hectares with the largest at 160,000 hectares. Currently there are a few million hectares being analyzed by the government to be granted as concessions.

Please contact us for more details.

About Sustainable Forestry

What is Sustainable Forestry?

Sustainable forest management (SFM) is the management of forests according to the principles of sustainable development. Sustainable forest management uses very broad social, economic and environmental goals. A range of forestry institutions now practice various forms of sustainable forest management and a broad range of methods and tools are available that have been tested over time.

The "Forest Principles" adopted at The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1992 captured the general international understanding of sustainable forest management at that time. A number of sets of criteria and indicators have since been developed to evaluate the achievement of SFM at both the country and management unit level. These were all attempts to codify and provide for independent assessment of the degree to which the broader objectives of sustainable forest management are being achieved in practice. In 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Non-Legally Binding Instrument on All Types of Forests. The instrument is the first of its kind, and reflects the strong international commitment to promote implementation of sustainable forest management through a new approach that brings all stakeholders together.

Definition

A definition of SFM was developed by the Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe MCPFE), and has since been adopted by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).[1] It defines sustainable forest management as:

The stewardship and use of forests and forest lands in a way, and at a rate, that maintains their biodiversity, productivity, regeneration capacity, vitality and their potential to fulfill, now and in the future, relevant ecological, economic and social functions, at local, national, and global levels, and that does not cause damage to other ecosystems.

In simpler terms, the concept can be described as the attainment of balance - balance between society's increasing demands for forest products and benefits, and the preservation of forest health and diversity. This balance is critical to the survival of forests, and to the prosperity of forest-dependent communities.

For forest managers, sustainably managing a particular forest tract means determining, in a tangible way, how to use it today to ensure similar benefits, health and productivity in the future. Forest managers must assess and integrate a wide array of sometimes conflicting factors - commercial and non-commercial values, environmental considerations, community needs, even global impact - to produce sound forest plans. In most cases, forest managers develop their forest plans in consultation with citizens, businesses, organizations and other interested parties in and around the forest tract being managed. The tools and visualization have been recently evolving for better management practices.

Because forests and societies are in constant flux, the desired outcome of sustainable forest management is not a fixed one. What constitutes a sustainably managed forest will change over time as values held by the public change.

Criteria

Criteria and indicators are tools which can be used to conceptualise, evaluate and implement sustainable forest management. Criteria define and characterize the essential elements, as well as a set of conditions or processes, by which sustainable forest management may be assessed. Periodically measured indicators reveal the direction of change with respect to each criterion.

Criteria and indicators of sustainable forest management are widely used and many countries produce national reports that assess their progress toward sustainable forest management. There are nine international and regional criteria and indicators initiatives, which collectively involve more than 150 countries. Three of the more advanced initiatives are those of the Working Group on Criteria and Indicators for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Temperate and Boreal Forests (also called the Montreal Process), the Ministerial Conference for the Protection of Forests in Europe, and the International Tropical Timber Organization. Countries who are members of the same initiative usually agree to produce reports at the same time and using the same indicators. Within countries, at the management unit level, efforts have also been directed at developing local level criteria and indicators of sustainable forest management. The Center for International Forestry Research, the International Model Forest Network and researchers at the University of British Columbia have developed a number of tools and techniques to help forest-dependent communities develop their own local level criteria and indicators. Criteria and Indicators also form the basis of third-party forest certification programs such as the Canadian Standards Association’s Sustainable Forest Management Standards and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative Standard.

There appears to be growing international consensus on the key elements of sustainable forest management. Seven common thematic areas of sustainable forest management have emerged based on the criteria of the nine ongoing regional and international criteria and indicators initiatives. The seven thematic areas are:

• Extent of forest resources
• Biological diversity
• Forest health and vitality
• Productive functions and forest resources
• Protective functions of forest resources
• Socio-economic functions
• Legal, policy and institutional framework

This consensus on common thematic areas (or criteria) effectively provides a common, implicit definition of sustainable forest management. The seven thematic areas were acknowledged by the international forest community at the fourth session of the United Nations Forum on Forests and the 16th session of the Committee on Forestry. These thematic areas have since been enshrined in the Non-Legally Binding Instrument on All Types of Forests as a reference framework for sustainable forest management to help achieve the purpose of the instrument.

The Ecosystem Approach has been prominent on the agenda of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) since 1995 . The CBD definition of the Ecosystem Approach and a set of principles for its application were developed at an expert meeting in Malawi in 1995, known as the Malawi Principles.[17] The definition, 12 principles and 5 points of "operational guidance" were adopted by the fifth Conference of Parties (COP5) in 2000. The CBD definition is as follows:

The ecosystem approach is a strategy for the integrated management of land, water and living resources that promotes conservation and sustainable use in an equitable way. Application of the ecosystem approach will help to reach a balance of the three objectives of the Convention. An ecosystem approach is based on the application of appropriate scientific methodologies focused on levels of biological organization, which encompasses the essential structures, processes, functions and interactions among organisms and their environment. It recognizes that humans, with their cultural diversity, are an integral component of many ecosystems.

Sustainable forest management was recognized by parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in 2004 (Decision VII/11 of COP7) to be a concrete means of applying the Ecosystem Approach to forest ecosystems. The two concepts, sustainable forest management and the ecosystem approach, aim at promoting conservation and management practices which are environmentally, socially and economically sustainable, and which generate and maintain benefits for both present and future generations. In Europe, the MCPFE and the Council for the Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy (PEBLDS) jointly recognized sustainable forest management to be consistent with the Ecosystem Approach in 2006.

Certified Wood

Growing environmental awareness and consumer demand for more socially responsible businesses helped third-party forest certification emerge in the 1990s as a credible tool for communicating the environmental and social performance of forest operations.

There are many potential users of certification, including: forest managers, scientists, policy makers, investors, environmental advocates, business consumers of wood and paper, and individuals.

With third-party forest certification, an independent organization develops standards of good forest management, and independent auditors issue certificates to forest operations that comply with those standards.

Forest certification verifies that forests are well-managed—as defined by a particular standard—and chain-of-custody certification tracks wood and paper products from the certified forest through processing to the point of sale.

This rise of certification led to the emergence of several different systems throughout the world. As a result, there is no single accepted forest management standard worldwide, and each system takes a somewhat different approach in defining standards for sustainable forest management.

In its 2009-2010 Forest Products Annual Market Review United Nations Economic Commission for Europe/Food and Agriculture Organization stated: "Over the years, many of the issues that previously divided the (certification) systems have become much less distinct. The largest certification systems now generally have the same structural programmatic requirements."

Third-party forest certification is an important tool for those seeking to ensure that the paper and wood products they purchase and use come from forests that are well-managed and legally harvested. Incorporating third-party certification into forest product procurement practices can be a centerpiece for comprehensive wood and paper policies that include factors such as the protection of sensitive forest values, thoughtful material selection and efficient use of products.

There are more than 50 certification standards worldwide, addressing the diversity of forest types and tenures. Globally, the two largest umbrella certification programs are:

• Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes
• Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)

The area of forest certified worldwide is growing slowly. PEFC is the world's largest forest certification system, with more than two-thirds of the total global certified area certified to its Sustainability Benchmarks.

In North America, there are three certification standards endorsed by PEFC - the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, the Canadian Standards Association’s Sustainable Forest Management Standard, and the American Tree Farm System. FSC has five standards in North America - one in the United States and four in Canada.

While certification is intended as a tool to enhance forest management practices throughout the world, to date most certified forestry operations are located in Europe and North America. A significant barrier for many forest managers in developing countries is that they lack the capacity to undergo a certification audit and maintain operations to a certification standard.

Sources

• Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe
• Evans, K., De Jong, W., and Cronkleton, P. (2008) "Future Scenarios as a Tool for Collaboration in Forest Communities". S.A.P.I.EN.S. 1 (2)
• Mozgeris, G. (2008) "The continuous field view of representing forest geographically: from cartographic representation towards improved management planning". S.A.P.I.EN.S. 1 (2)
• Guidelines for Developing, Testing and Selecting Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management Ravi Prabhu, Carol J. P. Colfer and Richard G. Dudley. 1999. CIFOR. The Criteria & Indicators Toolbox Series.
• Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management: A Compendium. Paper compiled by Froylán Castañeda, Christel Palmberg-Lerche and Petteri Vuorinen, May 2001. Forest Management Working Papers, Working Paper 5. Forest Resources Development Service, Forest Resources ivision. FAO, Rome (unpublished)]
• MPCI
• MCPFE indicators
• ITTO
• International Model Forest Network
• CIFOR Criteria and Indicators Toolbox Series
• International Model Forest Network Criteria and Indicators
• SFM Indicator Knowledge Base
• Canadian Standards Association
• Sustainable Forestry Initiative Introduction
• United Nations Forum on Forests (2004)
• Committee on Forestry (2003)

Brazil Sustainable Forestry Analsis

Strengths

• Excellent ROI
• Working to sustain forests and protect forests from clear cutting
• Carbon sequestration and secondary carbon credit income
• Multiple market end users
• Guaranteed future market
• Short term Return on Investment
• Relative low setup costs
• Certification Schemes (FSC) to solidify Market Position

Weaknesses

• Management and administration requires constant oversight
• Location of projects require large investment in security

Opportunities

• Unlimited marketing potential
• Unlimited market growth potential

Supply and Demand

The current price of wood is R$200 to R$1,000 per m3. With higher prices for finished produsThe younger the tree the lower the price.

Wood Products are the main usage for teak. This range from laminates for younger teak to solid wood - high end furniture for the oldest trees.

The key to a successful teak plantation is to not sell the trees but to sell sawn wood or a wood product. This, at a minimum will double the profits of the plantation. Big Lands Brazil operates small saw mills for each plantation that we currently manage. We see to it our clients make the most money on their investments.