AMATA

Sócios

Apesar da juventude empresarial, nossa intensa história tem início com o pioneirismo de Etel Carmona, que, há 20 anos, percebeu e concretizou o valor das madeiras nativas em móveis e objetos com design brasileiro exclusivo. Suas peças podem ser encontradas nas principais capitais do mundo, comercializadas através de uma consistente rede de distribuição. Trata-se da máxima agregação de valor que um produto madeireiro pode ter em nosso planeta.

Por outros caminhos, Roberto S. Waack, lançou e geriu por 5 anos, o que hoje é o maior projeto de manejo florestal tropical certificado do mundo, integrado a uma das maiores plantações de eucalipto do país. Um exemplo de consolidação, em grande escala, da economia da floresta nativa, transformando a floresta em risco em um empreendimento industrial com amplo reconhecimento social e ambiental. Roberto S. Waack, por conta deste empreendimento, foi eleito membro do Board Internacional do Forest Stewardship Council - FSC.

O amálgama entre o máximo da adição de valor em produtos florestais com a produção em grande escala, foi aportado por Dario Guarita Neto, que, egresso do mundo de administração de portfólios, visualizou grande oportunidade de investimento numa classe de ativo alternativa, porém segura e dinâmica, num setor onde o Brasil oferece claramente um alto diferencial competitivo frente ao resto do mundo. Estruturou-se assim o modelo de negócios que nos aproxima neste momento.

Etel, Roberto e Dario são os três sócios fundadores da AMATA, um empreendimento florestal criado com o maior cuidado profissional, fundamentado nas melhores informações sobre florestas disponíveis no Brasil e no mundo. Uma aliança com profundas raízes na crença de que é possível gerir florestas naturais e plantadas com tecnologias que garantam uma exploração econômica, social e ambientalmente consistente.

A AMATA é uma empresa florestal que tem como principal produto a madeira certificada. A exploração florestal com uso múltiplo engloba também produtos não madeireiros e serviços ambientais, alinhados à recente demanda por atividades com efeito redutor do aquecimento global.

Context

One of the main themes discussed in our days has been the issue of global warming and the environmental damages caused by human activity. Though there still are some controversies, rarely has the planet experience such convergence. Civil society, represented by the Non-Governmental Organizations, has been able to cause a strong repercussion on its actions toward forest preservation. The academic world, almost unanimously, has alerted political and economic agents to the need of making changes in their standards of development.

At the same time, the strong demand from economies in Asia, especially China and India, have resulted in an increase in the demand for grains, animal protein, and fiber in order to produce paper and fabrics. A demand for renewable fuels grows in the developed countries. The population pressure to occupy new frontiers in the less favorable economies is very great. These trends have resulted in a growing conversion of forests into lands used for agriculture and cattle raising.

The result of these two pressures, for the conservation of forests and for their conversion, has caused tension and conflicts to rise as well as been a driver in the search for innovative models for using natural resources.

The main initiatives put in place a more rational use of the land and include economic-ecological zoning, the delimitation of areas for permanent preservation, and the creation of legal reserves. There is an admitted need to create alternatives for how the populations that live around the forests can be involved in economic activities that also preserve the environment. Forests have become assets more and more scarce that today have their value recognized. The search for innovations in products, processes, and services that contribute to the generation of this value and ensure the survival of the high-value conservation areas has been strengthened by the organization of alternative systems of governance and certifications of good practices in agro-industrial and forestry management. Furthermore, the development of technologies for planting forests has ensured an alternative source of wood, which strongly contributes to reducing deforestation.

How the world and Amata deal with this context

AMATA fills the gap in this context through the activities that generate value in the natural forests, while consistently finding ways to include people living around the forests. At the same time it considers the need for plantations to supply the large demand for wood from various industrial activities.

AMATA also offers an alternative for integrating agricultural and cattle raising activities with the forests by working with the concepts of legal reserves in order to transform them into positive assets. Currently there is no economic incentive for maintaining and preserving the legal reserves on large agriculture and cattle raising properties. Consequently these areas are viewed only as expense generators.

One of the central elements of AMATA's strategy is the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certification as a minimum requirement for its activities and always within the concept of 3 Ps (People, Profit, and Planet).

The Brazil forest

Few countries are as competitive as Brazil when it comes to forestry activities. Earnings from products derived from forests reach 30 billion dollars in 2006.

The country has the largest native tropical forest mass on the planet with more than 470 million hectares. About 50% of this total is forests protected by federal or state governmental regulations. Despite this immense potential, the non-predatory forestry activity is almost lowermost. Less than 1% of the natural forest is used in a way considered sustainable by the application of management techniques. Despite Brazil being one of the largest hardwood producers, only 2% of the log production is certified. The country has almost 6 million hectares of planted forests with the best growth rates (AGR) on the planet. Almost half of this volume is certified.

 

Our Business

AMATA's business is the cubic meter of certified wood. The origin of this product can be from planted or natural forests. The markets AMATA will supply with its products are of solid wood (furniture, flooring, civil construction), fibers (pulp and paper), and energy (biomass, pig iron, and in the future cellulose alcohol).

AMATA also considers the business possibilities with non-timber products and environmental services, consolidating the concept of forests with a multiple use. These products can be used in the cosmetics, food, and pharmaceutical industries, as well as in the carbon credit commodities. These products were considered only as upsides for purposes of the company's Business Plan.

Our Business

Certified wood has a broad added value spectrum. It can be sold as logs, rough sawed lumber, plained lumber, dried wood, or processed for making flooring, frames, furniture, or accessories. Certified wood also has a broad application for generating renewable sources of energy as either a final product of byproduct of forest extractivism. This array of uses and applications makes it possible for certified wood to have market values that range from US$ 25 to US$ 25,000 per cubic meter.

As already mentioned, forests offer non-timber products as well, such as plants, fruit, seeds, fibers, and roots used for the production of extracts, oils, and pigments with the most varied applications and possibilities of added value. Furthermore, forests ensure what has been called environmental services such as the reduction of carbon concentrations in the atmosphere, climate, conservation of the water reserves, maintenance of biodiversity, among others. These forestry products have been a target of increasing economic interest and the object of intense innovative activity.

The image below shows the way AMATA views its relation with the forest. Various added-value alternatives are considered based on forest resources. Many of them are developed with specialized business partners in markets such as the pharmaceutical, cosmetics, or food industry. The concept of business clusters is fundamental for the generation of forest value.

It is not difficult to see the similarity between AMATA's logo and the added-value image.

The image also shows one of the main strategic principles at AMATA-social insertion. This is reached by the development of products in the areas surrounding the forests where the traditional populations as well as immigrants live. As AMATA sees it, this population is of utmost technological, cultural, and economic importance. The development of the tropical forest economy depends on innovation of timber products, non-timber products, and environmental services. The relation with these people has great potential in the transformation of traditional knowledge into science and technology. On the other hand, AMATA recognizes the need for developing new forms of governance related to the social organizations of these people.

The Amazon forest is inhabited by more than 20 million people. The development of a healthy forest economy from the social and environmental point of view depends on the insertion of these people in the value chain of the products made by company operating in these regions. The social impact demanded in large scale depends on new contractual frameworks between companies and the populations living in and around the forests. New financing models will be necessary so that the traditional initiatives for training these people in production, marketing, and quality be successful. If these people are not truly inserted into the economy of the natural forest, their preservation will be threatened. They represent the greatest risk to the conversion of forests into grazing lands, but at the same time is the greatest assurance that the forests will be looked after and protected if that is where their sustenance comes from.

 

The forest continuum principle

Inspired in the research developed by the FSC, AMATA understands that it is not necessary to establish dividing lines between the different types of forests. On one extreme are the permanently preserved forests with the natural public reserves, the ecological parks, and educational and tourism centers. On the other extreme are the large-scale monoculture tree plantations with a short cycle, such as eucalyptus and pine. These are called high impact management. Between these two is the low impact management: plantation of native trees, semi-natural tropical forest management, rubber and Brazil nut trees, extractivism forests, and areas of sustainable forest management. The closer they are to permanent preservation areas, the greater the conservation values. The closer they are to high human impact areas, the greater the care for environmental management.

Though it is not possible to establish dividing lines between the types of forests, each group has a set of more characteristic products and services. Environmental services are the basis of the permanent preservation areas. In the low impact management areas, these services are possible as well as timber and non-timber extractivism activities. The hardwood uses for furniture, flooring, and building comes from sustainable forest management areas. The high impact management, or more specifically plantations, is focused on growing wood for mechanically processed wood (MDF for example), fibers, and energy. It is also becoming quite common to develop plantations for growing hardwood such as Teak, and in this case the same applications are applied as the sustainable management of natural forests.

Continuum principle

An analysis of the efficient frontier of three characteristic types of forests shows that the traditional monoculture plantations such as eucalyptus and pine are of low risk and high returns. Plantations of species not traditional to Brazil, such as Teak, or native species present higher risks and probably lower returns than the traditional monocultures. Sustainable natural forest management, on the other hand, is of high risks and low returns. The greatest risk of these is related to various factors such as institutional, technological, merchandising, social, and environmental.

The professional management of the risks approaches these forest ventures at the efficiency frontier and overcome a situation where the risk is so high that it would jeopardize returns. The certification as a process of integrated management, tracking, and privileged access to the market, promotes a similar effect. AMATA not only offers professional management and certification, but it also offers to its shareholders and investors an array of forest ventures with risks and returns causing situations of synergy.

Risk & return - professional management incorporation

Plantations are alternative classes of investment that are stable, predictable, low risk and high volatility, generating a well-known commodity with various applications (long or short fiber wood). Natural forests are of high risk and low forecast ability. They are exposed to image and reputation extremes since the certified forests are aligned with the "green" movements that interact with illegal and predatory exploitations. Managed natural tropical forests are in a transition process from an informal economy to a formal and professionalized one associated with the preservation of environmental assets that are continually being more valued. They offer a wide range of opportunities and upsides.

The typical internal rate of return for plantations in Brazil is around 15%. The rates for natural forests, on the other hand, indicate a great variation and lack of information. As the product is processed, the rates increase from levels close to zero up to expressive two-digit levels.

AMATA strategy - comparative portrait

Tir e upsides