Brazil 's agrarian federal agency should reject a proposal to downsize a sustainable settlement in a deforested area of the Amazon region, Human Rights Watch said today. If approved, the reduction would open the door to legitimizing illegal land occupations inside the settlement that are driving deforestation and violence against small-scale farmers who are its legitimate residents, Human Rights Watch wrote in a letter to the agency's president.
The National Institute for Colonization and Land Reform (Instituto Nacional de Colonização e Reforma Agrária, INCRA), a federal agency responsible for land reform across Brazil, is currently considering a proposal to reduce the Sustainable Development Settlement Terra Nossa to approximately half of its current size. Established by INCRA expressly to balance land redistribution for smallholders with sustainable forest management, Terra Nossa has become a hotspot for illegal land occupations, deforestation, and violence against its legitimate residents due to failures to fully implement the settlement and enforce the law.
"Downsizing Terra Nossa would reward people illegally occupying land with impunity and could leave legitimate residents vulnerable to further violence," said Maria Laura Canineu, deputy environment and human rights director at Human Rights Watch. "The Brazilian government should publicly reject any reduction of Terra Nossa, immediately remove those illegally occupying areas inside Terra Nossa, and support small farmers' sustainable livelihoods."
Extending over 150,000 hectares across the municipalities of Novo Progresso and Altamira in southern Pará state, Terra Nossa has the capacity to settle 1,000 families of small farmers, who would grow fruits and vegetables in their individual plots and pursue sustainable economic activities in the collective forest reserve, such as the collection of nuts and fruits.
The proposal to reduce Terra Nossa follows a process of illegal land occupations, deforestation, and violence against its legitimate residents.
Only 298 plots of land for small-scale farming have been demarcated, according to an INCRA report from 2018, which also identified 77 persons that were illegally occupying 117,000 hectares, approximately 80 percent of the settlement's total area.
Legitimate residents of the settlement live in fear due to intimidation, threats, and killings, as documented by Human Rights Watch over the years. A report published by Human Rights Watch in 2019 described the killing of two people after they expressed their intention to denounce illegal logging. A third person vanished, and residents believe he was also killed. The brother of one of the victims, who was investigating the crime, was killed as well.
People responsible for the illegal occupations have destroyed large areas of forest and converted most of it into pasture. Terra Nossa lost 7,700 hectares of forest-5 percent of its total area-between 2021 and 2024, according to Mapbiomas, a consortium of scientists that monitors changes in land cover and land use in several countries.
In 2023, arson fires destroyed the crops and livelihoods of Terra Nossa's small-scale farmers with the apparent goal of forcing them to leave the settlement and turn the charred land into cattle ranches, Human Rights Watch found.
According to officials, residents, and INCRA documents, the proposal under consideration would reduce Terra Nossa to 80,000 hectares-which would be an almost 50 percent reduction-and eliminate the settlement's environmental purpose. At least 16,800 illegally occupied hectares are included in the area that would be cut from Terra Nossa, according to INCRA documents. Such a move could pave the way for those responsible for illegal land occupations to eventually regularize their holdings, which would be impossible without reworking Terra Nossa's borders.
Despite the INCRA report's recommendation for the agency to retake the area to combat illegal land occupations, the INCRA leadership has not yet evicted those responsible. In March 2025, federal prosecutors filed a lawsuit against INCRA demanding that, within 60 days, the agency complete its administrative review of land claims in Terra Nossa, notify those occupying land illegally to leave the area, and request a judicial eviction order for those who refuse to leave after receiving notification.
In response to this lawsuit, INCRA informed the court that as of April 2025, it had completed 37 out of 76 administrative procedures concerning illegal occupation of land and sent those to the Federal Specialized General Attorney's office, which is responsible for filing lawsuits to obtain judicial orders of eviction. The 37 procedures account for nearly 79,000 hectares, or 52 percent, of Terra Nossa's area.
The plan under consideration is the second attempt to reduce the size of Terra Nossa. The first one, in 2015, was shut down after the federal prosecutor's recommendation to cancel it due to the lack of legal or technical grounds. If approved, the current reduction would set a damaging precedent for other settlements in Brazil facing similar land pressures.
"Publicly and unequivocally rejecting the reduction of Terra Nossa and evicting those illegally occupying land are key steps to protect its lawful residents and other settlements across the Amazon," Canineu said. "By doing so, Brazil will also send the message to those illegally occupying land that they can't operate with impunity."
