The deforestation and re/forestation in western Santa Catarina in the 1960s and 1970s

Abstract

The State of Santa Catarina has undergone several environmental transformations, mostly caused by the anthropization of the landscape. Deforestation was intensified from the first half of the twentieth century, after the occupation of the region and due to logging activities. The objective of this article was to analyze some practices of deforestation and reforestation, in the West of Santa Catarina, in the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1950s and 1960s, occurred the peak of logging activities in the state. In the governments of the presidents of the military civil dictators, developmentalist projects, of an immediate nature, were approved via state and federal governments, which resulted in great environmental losses. In the following decade, reforestation practices were introduced, but characterized by being carried out through monoculture of forest species, as they are not aligned with the measures of recomposition of the original flora. To achieve the proposed objective, the sources used are: maps, government reports, demographic censuses, regional and state journals, iconography, and federal legislation. Therefore, the aim is to understand how the landscape transformation process occurred, and the measures for conservation or not of the ecosystems involved.