Pablo Pacheco | World Wildlife Fund Inc. (original) (raw)

Papers by Pablo Pacheco

Este trabajo analiza los primeros diez anos de implementacion de la nueva Ley Forestal de Bolivia... more Este trabajo analiza los primeros diez anos de implementacion de la nueva Ley Forestal de Bolivia, la cual ha generado importantes cambios en la gestion forestal boliviana y resultados positivos en la distribucion de derechos, la puesta en practica de nuevas reglas del juego para hacer manejo forestal y una mayor descentralizacion forestal. No obstante, si bien se han dado avances significativos en relacion con el regimen forestal anterior, no se ha avanzado sustancialmente hacia la gestion forestal sostenible, principalmente porque no se ha podido contener la ilegalidad forestal y no se ha promovido una distribucion equitativa de los beneficios economicos provenientes del manejo forestal. Tampoco se ha podido controlar las fuerzas que actuan por fuera del sector forestal, alentando la perdida de los bosques. Este articulo senala que no solo se debe avanzar en el rediseno de politicas para incentivar el desarrollo forestal sino tambien estimular mercados forestales mas justos.

Sustainability

The expansion of oil palm plantation has caused adverse impacts on the ecosystem. It has been ass... more The expansion of oil palm plantation has caused adverse impacts on the ecosystem. It has been associated with deforestation, biodiversity loss, disturbances to environmental services and livelihood change. The government of Indonesia has made an effort to control the negative effects by issuing relevant policies. One of the policies is Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO)’s sustainability standards to which large-scale plantations and smallholders are obliged to adhere. This study assesses the readiness of two types of smallholders, namely, the nucleus–plasma scheme and independent smallholders to adopt ISPO standards. Using a case study research approach in two oil palm plantation villages in East Kalimantan, the study found out a number of ISPO implementation challenges, grouped into structural and socio-cultural challenges, which make smallholders less ready to adhere to this mandatory policy. Coping with these challenges, this study proposed that land and business legality pro...

Ambio

With the Brazilian military governments of the 1960s, systematic economic development of the Amaz... more With the Brazilian military governments of the 1960s, systematic economic development of the Amazon began. Social and environmental concerns have entered Amazonian discourses and policies only since the 1990s. Since then, reports of threats to forests and indigenous people have alternated with reports of socio-economic progress and environmental achievements. These contradictions often arise from limited thematic, sectoral, temporal, or spatial perspectives, and lead to misinterpretation. Our paper offers a comprehensive picture of discourses, policies, and socio-environmental dynamics for the entire region over the last five decades. We distinguish eight historical policy phases, each of which had little effect on near-linear dynamics of demographic growth and land-use expansion, although some policies showed the potential to change the course of development. To prevent local, national, and international actors from continuing to assert harmful interests in the region, a coherent l...

BOIS & FORETS DES TROPIQUES

La foresterie communautaire est une voie jugée prometteuse pour améliorer la situation souvent pr... more La foresterie communautaire est une voie jugée prometteuse pour améliorer la situation souvent précaire des familles en milieu rural tout en contribuant à la conservation des forêts. Des organisations nationales et internationales encouragent cette pratique en affichant un ensemble d'objectifs clairs visant l'utilisation légale des forêts, des récoltes à faible impact, une commercialisation sur des marchés extérieurs et le recours à des services de formation technique. Si l'on peut faire état de certaines expériences et réalisations réussies, la plupart des initiatives de foresterie communautaire sont confrontées à des défis importants et ne subsistent qu'avec des aides extérieures. Un bilan des expériences de foresterie communautaire en Amérique tropicale suggère que, pour mieux répondre aux réalités de terrain, celleci doit passer d'une approche fondée sur des transferts de technologies et des plans d'organisation sociale définis à l'extérieur à des str...

International Forestry Review

Forest Policy and Economics

Land

The expansion of oil palm plantations in Papua province, Indonesia, involves the conversion of fo... more The expansion of oil palm plantations in Papua province, Indonesia, involves the conversion of forests, among other land types in the landscapes, which are a source of clan members’ livelihoods. The way in which this expansion occurs makes it necessary to understand the factors associated with why companies look for frontier lands and what externalities are generated during both the land acquisition and plantation development periods. Using a spatial analysis of the concession areas, along with data from household surveys of each clan from the Auyu, Mandobo, and Marind tribes who release land to companies, we find that investors are motivated to profit from timber harvested from the clearing of lands for plantations, activity that is facilitated by the local government. Land acquisition and plantation development have resulted in externalities to indigenous landowners in the form of time and money lost in a series of meetings and consultations involving clan members and traditional ...

Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, 2015

The paper uses a policy integration (PI) approach to analyse forest sector reforms in tropical co... more The paper uses a policy integration (PI) approach to analyse forest sector reforms in tropical countries, using the case of reforms that affected the northern Bolivia forest economy. The paper provides a brief overview of PI and then analyses the various reforms that all contributed to reshaping Bolivia's forest sector. The major related reforms are not only forestland tenure reforms, a new forestry law, but also important public administrative and democratic reforms. The case of democratic reforms linked with land and forestry reforms in northern Bolivia makes it possible to discuss environmental PI in a tropical context, and thus to review some of the key postulates that have been formulated on the topic, but which are to date largely based on empirical experiences from the northern hemisphere.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Jan 28, 2014

Annual deforestation rates in the Brazilian Amazon fell by 77% between 2004 and 2011, yet have st... more Annual deforestation rates in the Brazilian Amazon fell by 77% between 2004 and 2011, yet have stabilized since 2009 at 5,000-7,000 km(2). We provide the first submunicipality assessment, to our knowledge, of actor-specific contributions to the deforestation slowdown by linking agricultural census and remote-sensing data on deforestation and forest degradation. Almost half (36,158 km(2)) of the deforestation between 2004 and 2011 occurred in areas dominated by larger properties (>500 ha), whereas only 12% (9,720 km(2)) occurred in areas dominated by smallholder properties (<100 ha). In addition, forests in areas dominated by smallholders tend to be less fragmented and less degraded. However, although annual deforestation rates fell during this period by 68-85% for all actors, the contribution of the largest landholders (>2,500 ha) to annual deforestation decreased over time (63% decrease between 2005 and 2011), whereas that of smallholders went up by a similar amount (69%) ...

A global overview of decentralization processes in Africa, Asia and Latin America, developed as i... more A global overview of decentralization processes in Africa, Asia and Latin America, developed as input for the United Nations Forum on Forests

Sustainability

Ambio

BOIS & FORETS DES TROPIQUES

International Forestry Review

Forest Policy and Economics

Land

Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, 2015

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Jan 28, 2014

CIFOR-CEDLA, La Paz, …, 2009

... se agradece el apoyo de: Aroldo Santos Zelaya, Arnulfo Cruz Guerrero, Carlos Andrés Zelaya, E... more ... se agradece el apoyo de: Aroldo Santos Zelaya, Arnulfo Cruz Guerrero, Carlos Andrés Zelaya, Eduardo Bahr, Gustavo Morales Galindo, Juan Blas Zapata, Luis Torres Pérez ... Ortega, Erwin Aguilera, Rudy Guzmán, Arturo Moscoso, Ovidio Roca, Thelmo Muñoz, José Luis ...

... 1 / 1 Seleccione referencia / Select reference. Signatura: L-300-72. Autor: Fernandez, Javier... more ... 1 / 1 Seleccione referencia / Select reference. Signatura: L-300-72. Autor: Fernandez, Javier; Pacheco, Pablo; Schulze, Juan Carlos. Título: Marco de Interpretación de la Cuestión Agraria en Bolivia. Notas: Lista de Publicaciones del CEDLA. P.imprenta: julio de 1991. 98 p.. ...

Conversion of tropical forests to industrial production of agricultural commodities is a main dri... more Conversion of tropical forests to industrial production of agricultural commodities is a main driver of climate change and biodiversity loss. In response, ambitious zero-deforestation pledges have been made by a growing number of global consumer manufacturer companies, international agricultural traders, agro-industrial companies, and governments, to establish deforestation-free supply chains. These commitments are seen as crucial in eliminating tropical deforestation through public and private action, but also in making progress to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. And what is new is that the private sector is firmly on board and part of the solution, compared to past approaches that were largely publicly supported initiatives. Much has been achieved and in a very short space of time. But more is needed. So how can private and public commitments work better? The 40 contributions in this edition of ETFRN News reflect the strong interest in zero deforestation commitments and show how lively and rapidly evolving the debate is. There are many different experiences and views of what to do from different quarters and not everyone agrees to everything, but the following eight ways to enhance the implementation, effectiveness and impact of pledges have been drawn from lessons learned and views expressed. 1. Agree on clear definitions and standards — what is a forest; what is deforestation, and what are acceptable credible and coherent standards for use across different commodities. 2. National and local governments to become more involved — since failure to address broader governance challenges may reduce the positive impact of private-sector zero-deforestation initiatives. 3. More corporate transparency and accountability — must become the norm for monitoring and reporting progress, and not just regarding zero deforestation commitments.

This chapter presents an analysis across the cases for the prerequisite conditions included in th... more This chapter presents an analysis across the cases for the prerequisite conditions included in the analytic framework. Sections 3.1−3.7 focus on the prerequisite conditions relating to policies, institutions, and governance; sections 3.8−3.12, on those relating to livelihoods, capacities, and socioeconomic aspects; and section 3.13, on research and monitoring.

Forests under Pressure - Local Responses to Global Issues, 2014

Las reformas de la tenencia forestal han otorgado derechos formales sobre tierras y recursos fore... more Las reformas de la tenencia forestal han otorgado derechos formales sobre tierras y recursos forestales a los pequeños productores y las comunidades. En este artículo se exponen las diversas formas en las que estos actores locales se relacionan con los mercados de la madera en el contexto de dichas reformas. Asimismo se sostiene que los beneficios económicos que las comunidades pueden obtener del uso de los recursos forestales, principalmente la madera, están influenciados por dos conjuntos de factores que no están directamente asociados con el proceso de reforma de la tenencia. El primer conjunto de factores se refiere a la capacidad de las comunidades para interactuar con otros actores —intermediarios y empresas— en los mercados de la madera y el segundo, a las condiciones específicas de evolución de dichos mercados. Las interacciones entre capacidad comunitaria y condiciones del mercado determinan las formas en las que los pequeños productores y las comunidades participan en los ...

Analysing REDD+: Challenges and choices, 2012

Resumen En este artículo se evalúan las condiciones económicas, técnicas y de gobernanza que conf... more Resumen En este artículo se evalúan las condiciones económicas, técnicas y de gobernanza que configuran el manejo forestal en los trópicos en América Latina, con especial énfasis en las iniciativas para reducir las emisiones de carbono relacionadas con los bosques. Asimismo, se ofrece un marco para la discusión de las formas para mejorar el manejo forestal conducente a lograr objetivos ambientales que al mismo tiempo promuevan el desarrollo nacional y local, y contribuyan a los medios de vida de las poblaciones ...

• Different types of interactions are emerging involving public and private (non-state) actors ac... more • Different types of interactions are emerging involving public and private (non-state) actors across sustainability initiatives in the palm oil sector in Indonesia. • Such initiatives include the development of government standards for sustainable palm oil, legislation related to the setting aside of conservation areas, a 'wave' of provincial and district Green Growth programs, a focus on jurisdictional approaches, and efforts around smallholder registration. These have been accompanied by the emergence of a number of political 'champions' in the form of provincial and district leaders. • Some initiatives can help to implement immediate specific sustainability objectives by filling implementation gaps, by bearing some operational costs and by speeding up regulatory change. • To bring about the transformation and to move beyond a proliferation of pilot schemes, interactions would need to survive political cycles and align with ongoing national processes of reform around natural resource policy. • Those initiatives intended as innovative pilots or to kick start a process in unclear legal contexts may benefit from acting quickly outside of more formal state systems. However, there are clear benefits in integrating initiatives into existing executive systems to help weather and uncertain electoral cycles. • Some actions by non-state actors act to strengthen the capacity of public authority and accountability, whereas others can weaken or undermine these public systems.

• The land-use change caused by oil palm expansion results in adverse impacts on ecosystem functi... more • The land-use change caused by oil palm expansion results in adverse impacts on ecosystem functions and services provided by natural forests.
• This study assesses the impacts of oil palm expansion on key ecosystem services and analyzes the trade-offs among ecosystem services under four plausible future land-use scenarios in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia: business as usual, moratorium, zero gross deforestation and sustainable intensification.
• A trade-off between carbon benefit and habitat quality was observed in the area with low carbon stock. Providing some habitat quality in areas of oil palm expansion enhanced the carbon benefit.
• A synergy between carbon sequestration and water yield was evident due to oil palm expansion on Dry Rice Land with Mixed Scrub under the zero gross deforestation scenario.
• Among the four plausible LULC scenarios, zero gross deforestation is the most desirable option for the study area in Central Kalimantan.
• A successful implementation of zero gross deforestation requires a review of the forest moratorium to encompass all forest types, a clear land-use policy strategy and a detailed land-use plan involving all jurisdictions and engagement of stakeholders.
• Sustainable intensification is the second-best land use and land cover option for oil palm expansion. It may be achievable by providing appropriate and adequate technical and management supports to smallholder farms and by ensuring off-take markets for oil palm produced by smallholders.

• This brief examines two contrasting policy options: the implementation of zero deforestation co... more • This brief examines two contrasting policy options: the implementation of zero deforestation commitments by the private sector and a complete moratorium on the expansion of large-scale oil palm plantations, and compares them to a situation without policy action. • The zero deforestation commitments and the moratorium on large-scale oil palm plantations expansion could reduce cumulative deforestation by 25% and 28%, respectively, compared to a situation without policy action. They could also cut greenhouse gas emissions from land use and land-use change by 13% and 16%, respectively, over the period 2010–2030. • Even under the zero-deforestation and moratorium scenarios, Indonesia is projected to increase palm oil production between 124%–97% over 2010–2030, which is partly due to higher production originating from smallholders. • Both measures – the zero deforestation commitments and a moratorium of future large-scale oil palm plantations expansion – would be especially beneficial to limit future deforestation in Indonesia in a context in which global demand for palm oil is expected to keep increasing. • Foresight tools can equip stakeholders and policy makers with data and information to allow for evidence-based policy making. This will permit planning for reducing deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions, and finding options acceptable to all stakeholders involved.

• The global palm oil value chain has grown in complexity over time as have the public and privat... more • The global palm oil value chain has grown in complexity over time as have the public and private regulations governing the sector. This influences stakeholder decisions along the palm oil supply chain and the territories where it is produced. • Weak alignment between the many regulatory initiatives has given rise to a 'transnational regime complex' that is struggling to resolve effectively many structural performance issues that have long plagued the palm oil sector. • Key performance issues facing the palm oil sector relate to pervasive land conflict and informality, yield differences between companies and smallholders, and a high carbon debt linked to emissions arising from deforestation and peatlands conversion. • Different disconnects, complementarities and antagonisms characterize current governance. Building connections and enhancing complementarities are important ways to gradually reduce antagonisms. • Complementarities have emerged among instruments with global reach, whereas disconnects persist especially within public regulations, between regulations and private standards, and between standards operating across different territorial scales. • Several connections can be built by better linking existing regulations, and public regulations and private standards at different levels. These could arise by embracing approaches that look at both supply chain and territorial management. • The main policy targets to achieve sustainability and inclusivity are: 1) limiting the expansion of palm oil in high-carbon forests and peatlands; 2) adopting mechanisms to enhance transparency and accountabilities; 3) creating conditional incentives to intensify palm oil supply, mainly of smallholder farmers; 4) adopting new approaches to facilitate the upgrade of smallholder production systems; and 5) legalizing tenure claims under different types of rights recognition schemes.

Article 13 of the Paris Agreement calls for enhanced transparency in climate actions. At the same... more Article 13 of the Paris Agreement calls for enhanced transparency in climate actions. At the same time, non-state actors (NSAs) are increasingly referred to within the text of decisions and initiatives by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). However, the continued use of such a broad and undefined term to represent a complex set of stakeholders – ranging from academia to private sector, civil society to indigenous peoples groups – is unhelpful. There cannot be a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to NSAs. • The private sector is a complex and diverse subset of NSAs, with significant variations in capacity, motivations and priorities across companies and value chains. Their response to climate change will be key to setting and achieving the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) made by Parties to the UNFCCC. • A large number of international corporations have made voluntary commitments to reduce their negative environmental and social impacts in the agriculture and forestry sectors, within their own operations as well as those of third-party suppliers. Many of these pledges have now been registered on the UNFCCC non-state actor platform (NAZCA). As yet, however, there is no systematic way to track and verify these pledges and their impacts. • One major risk is that stringent and rapidly implemented corporate commitments related to sustainable and 'deforestation free' supply chains will exclude already marginalized smallholders, who often operate within broader informal economies, resulting in indirect detrimental social and environmental impacts. Aside from the Cancun safeguards, such risks remain unrecognized by the UNFCCC. • Public funds, such as the Green Climate Fund (GCF), could be used to financially support smallholders and small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and upgrade their production systems through the adoption of improved practices and by facilitating their access to sustainable supply chains. • Governments, indigenous peoples groups and civil society organizations, as well as corporations themselves, are monitoring the progress and impact of NSA pledges at different spatial scales. But significant challenges remain regarding the alignment of methods, metrics and data sets, disclosure of information, and the verification and monitoring of indirect impacts. • There is currently no systematic way to track delivery of voluntary commitments through transparent processes that are open to wider society. Additional efforts, including national and international political architectures are needed. • There is justification for the UNFCCC to develop guidance around NSA engagement in climate mitigation and adaptation actions. This can help to distinguish between different groups of NSAs and track the activities undertaken by diverse private sector actors, to better understand how they contribute to achieving NDCs.

• A governance approach, combining public policy and private initiatives was effective in slowing... more • A governance approach, combining public policy and private initiatives was effective in slowing down deforestation, but was unable to support a transition to more sustainable production systems. • New technical intensification models must be identified for low-productivity systems in degraded lands, adapted to the biophysical and sociotechnical conditions of the Amazonian landscapes. • Multiple constraints inhibit progress toward sustainable intensification of cattle ranching, and reversing them requires that all such constraints be addressed in a coordinated way. • Designing options that work for all stakeholders, and monitoring and verifying progress of territories toward sustainability is essential to support current public policies and private initiatives.

• Several sustainability certification schemes have been developed for palm oil; however, the fie... more • Several sustainability certification schemes have been developed for palm oil; however, the field impacts of these schemes remain highly uncertain. The Sustainable Palm Oil Production (SPOP) project, funded by the French National Research Agency (ANR), was aimed at consolidating and deepening the scientific basis of these schemes. • SPOP field work undertaken in Indonesia and Cameroon highlighted the large variability in practices and impacts of oil palm systems. Our main results related to the uncovering of the multiplicity of growers and their trajectories, and identifying room for improvement and the need for recommendations adapted to the various grower contexts and strategies. • The SPOP project made it explicit that visions of sustainability and global challenges vary greatly among growers and other stakeholders involved in the palm oil sector. These diverging conceptions are most likely to induce bottlenecks in the definition and implementation of good practices and should be accounted for in the refinement of sustainability criteria. • Within the SPOP project, we investigated possible futures for oil palm using participatory prospective analyses and multi-agent-based modeling work. Our research work showed that capacity development and the organizational capacity of smallholders, fair partnerships and combined forms of governance are key drivers in ensuring the uptake of good practices and sustainable development at the landscape scale.

Key points • The Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, launched in 20... more Key points • The Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, launched in 2003, is the European Union's (EU) response to the global fight against illegal logging. In particular, FLEGT aims at reducing trade in illegal timber between the EU and timber producer partner countries. • FLEGT operates through two major instruments: bilateral trade agreements — known as voluntary partnership agreements (VPAs) — that are signed with willing producer countries, and the European Union Timber Regulation (EUTR), which came into force in March 2013. The EUTR mandates EU importers to exert due diligence in their sourcing of timber from abroad to exclude illegal supplies. • To date, six countries have signed VPAs. Among them, five have committed to apply VPA provisions regarding legality verification not only to timber imported to Europe, but also to timber traded on the domestic market in signatory producer countries. This means that timber harvested and traded on the domestic market will be regulated by national VPA licensing schemes (the so-called Timber Legality Assurance System, [TLAS]). • Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ecuador and Indonesia are characterized by a large, vibrant and largely informal domestic timber sector, which supports the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of local forest users including small-scale farmers, indigenous communities, chainsaw millers, traders and service providers such as transporters. The domestic sector in Gabon is less significant due to the country's small population and the concentration of activities in the capital. In most countries, employment in the informal sector is comparable to or higher than the formal industrial timber sector. The estimated number of informal jobs provided by the sector varies greatly among countries, from about 45,000 in Cameroon to about 1.5 million in Indonesia. • In all countries studied, the domestic timber sector is characterized by the activities of smallholders, chainsaw millers and traders, who rarely own a legal harvesting permit and extract and process small quantities of timber with chain or mobile saws. The resulting low-quality timber is traded in domestic markets or across the borders of neighboring countries, with little formal taxation. Research results indicate, however, that as the product moves along the production chain, 5–15% of the total costs incurred by informal operators are paid in bribes to representatives of ministries, local police, the military and customs officials. • By agreeing to include the domestic sector as an integral part of their TLAS, producer countries are committing to undertake broad governance reforms of the entire forestry sector. Implicitly, such reforms entail formalization of the domestic sector through monitoring, control and verification. • In the countries of the Congo Basin and in Indonesia, such reforms will require the redrafting of current legal frameworks, which are designed around industrial large-scale export-oriented forestry operations, conducted by politically powerful companies with logging concessions. In all countries, existing laws are not structured to sustain a healthy, small-scale, domestic timber market. Research findings indicate a need to improve and simplify access to the resource; to develop and adopt specific fiscal regimes for the domestic timber sector (e.g. royalty rates, processing, transport and marketing levies); to improve access to credit on favorable terms for small-scale operators; to create incentives to comply with the law; and to improve flows of information to small-scale operators. • In countries that have already signed a VPA (Cameroon and Indonesia) or continue to negotiate them (DRC and Gabon), local forest users and traders have been largely absent from in-country VPA negotiations. This reflects their large numbers, distribution over a vast territory and poor organizational capacity, as well as the tensions that often exist between the central governments' stated willingness to formalize them, and the rent-seeking behavior of decentralized officials. Hence, before reforms are initiated, 2 specific channels of communication need to be set up for chainsaw millers and traders to discuss their needs, customary governance systems, and the potential challenges and expectations of formalization. • Similarly, results indicate that the degree of governmental inclusiveness that characterized the initial VPA discussions tends to decrease over time, as political momentum is lost. Government agencies other than forestry and environment ministries may be excluded from the final phases of implementation, when legal reforms will have to be adopted. This could entail enforcement failures, as agencies may be unwilling to enforce rules they did not contribute to creating. The engagement of other ministries, in particular ministries of finance, is necessary for a meaningful national discussion of the financial implications of a functional TLAS for operators, especially small-scale ones. Such discussions have not yet taken place. This could engender implementation failures, if the advantages of the system are not evaluated from inception against the disadvantages (e.g. costs to operators). • Formalization processes come with both benefits and risks, which require ongoing assessment, monitoring and mitigation. Case studies of formalization conducted in other natural resource sectors indicate that even well-intentioned processes can lead to exclusion, criminalization, barriers to entry and elite capture. These could disproportionally and negatively affect smallholders and small-scale operators, and lead to negative environmental impacts. If well conceived and monitored, formalization could increase transparency and clarity of users' rights, reduce conflict and improve working conditions and local economic benefits.

Scope and purpose of the research During the last 40 years, the beef sector has by large been the... more Scope and purpose of the research During the last 40 years, the beef sector has by large been the main driver of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. The States of Mato Grosso, Pará and Rondônia constitute the three largest producers of beef in this region. These states comprise 58 million cattle heads (28% of the total national herd) spread over 32.1 million hectares of pasture (53% of the total pastureland in the Amazon Biome). There is an extensive and growing body of work assessing the factors driving the expansion of cattle ranching in this region (Poccard Chapuis, 2004; Veiga and al., 2004; Barreto, Pereira and Arima, 2005; Pacheco and Poccard, 2011). The beef chain has been increasingly acknowledged by NGOs as the major source of deforestation (Friends of the Earth, 2009; Greenpeace, 2009). In the past, public regulations alone were insufficient to halt the expansion of cattle ranching over forests, and the major meatpacking companies did refuse to control their suppliers. Such situation, however, began to reverse. Shifting from a " shaming the corporation name " to a " building new agreements " situation, private and public actors have then engaged in a negotiation process around mechanisms for enhancing the governance of beef supply chain while explicitly embracing some sustainability goals. Scholars stress the role of state actors in this process. All kinds of private regulation must, in some way, relate to existing regulatory frameworks, in particular, national legislation. Thus, the development of a state regulatory framework can pave the way for private regulation or reinforce it (Bartley, 2007; Gulbrandsen, 2005; Rametsteiner, 2002). We analyse the private and public drivers that lead the meatpacking companies' decisions to control their suppliers in the Amazon, the main governance mechanisms emerged, and their limits from observation on current practices. Methodology Our work is based on a historical review of the process and on qualitative interviews with 61 key private and public stakeholders located in the three main beef producing Amazon States (Mato Grosso, Pará, Rondônia) and Sao Paolo and Brasilia, which were conducted between 2011 and 2015. A data display matrix for qualitative analysis was elaborated to organize and analyse patterns of response. The respondents were classified into six types: cattle ranchers, industry sector, retailers, NGO's members, public officials and other informants (e.g. academics, agrochemical sector, technicians, and private and public banks representatives). The responses were analyzed with regards to understanding around three main themes: i) main drivers of change shaping beef supply chain; ii) existing governance systems and mechanisms, iii) the limits and challenges for an effective governance of the beef supply chain in the Amazon.