- Brazil has 23% of global reserves of rare earth minerals, second only to China, but its production remains at an early stage, accounting for only 1% of the global market.
- The race to mine and process rare earths in Brazil has raised fears among community leaders, particularly in rural settlements that are the focus of some 187 rare earth mining applications currently in process.
- In these areas, rare earth mining activities risks exacerbating land disputes and devastating preserved forests — including one in Bahia state that hosts a 600-year-old endangered Brazilwood tree.
Brazil ranks among the countries with the largest reserves of rare earth elements. But scaling up the extraction of these metals, used in various high-tech applications and essential to the clean energy transition, could lead to an increase conflicts in at least five Brazilian states, activists warn.
Brazil holds 23% of global rare earth reserves, according to the 2025 U.S. Mineral Commodity Summaries. That makes it second only to China, which controls the supply chain for minerals in terms of both reserves and processing, and has used this to wield geopolitical influence. However, Brazilian production remains at an early stage, accounting for only 1% of the global market. This is expected to change quickly with new projects currently in progress.
The increased interest in rare earths is raising fears among community leaders in the country. Rural settlements that have been demarcated by INCRA, the national land reform institute, are now facing requests to explore for these minerals on their territory.
According to research by the Mining Observatory, there are 187 applications for rare earth mining targeting 96 INCRA-registered settlements across Brazil. The state of Bahia has the most, with 88 applications, followed by Goiás with 53 and Pernambuco with 21. The search for rare earths in these areas, which overlap with settlements, is led by mostly obscure companies.
The 600-year-old tree vs. the mine
The two most advanced applications target the Reunidas Pau Brasil Sustainable Development Project, a rural settlement established in Bahia’s Itamaraju municipality. According to National Mining Agency (ANM) data, the applications were filed by the company Multiverse Mineração Ltda.
The company reports that it’s already mining in this area “near the village of São Paulinho, also in the municipality of Itamaraju.” According to Multiverse, in 2022 it discovered deposits “containing excellent concentrations of rare earth minerals in ionic clay” within an area of nearly 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres).
This could potentially turn into a conflict if the company goes on to obtain mining authorization from the ANM and begins the extraction process in this area, where 48 families have lived since the settlement’s creation in 2009. The site also hosts one of the oldest Brazilwood trees in the world.
In 2020, researchers discovered a 600-year-old Brazilwood tree (Paubrasilia echinata) in the Reunidas Pau Brasil settlement. The tree, with a trunk circumference of 7.13 meters (23 feet), is the largest recorded in the country and is used as shade and shelter for the cacao trees that the settlement’s farmers cultivate through their agroforestry system.
Brazilwood is the country’s national tree, and in fact gave the country its name. The species was among the most exploited by Portuguese colonizers since the 16th century, due to the red pigment obtained from its trunk, as well as the wood used in furniture and church building.
Since the occupation and industrialization of Brazil over the past five centuries have concentrated in coastal areas, the Atlantic Forest is by far the biome most devastated in the country. Only 24% of the original forest is left, and only 12% is considered well-preserved. As a result, Brazilwood, which is endemic to this biome, became nearly extinct in the early 20th century. Still a rare and endangered tree, it now faces added pressure from its use in crafting bows for stringed musical instruments.
Devastation with government support
Nevertheless, the government of Bahia endorses the exploration of rare earths in the state, which is also where the Portuguese explorers first arrived in the 16th century. It has already signed a memorandum of understanding with another company, Borborema Mineração, for institutional support for a rare earths processing plant through the state’s Secretariat of Economic Development (SDE).
The agreement formalizes “the intention of both parties to facilitate the implementation of a production unit for the production of rare earth oxide mineral concentrate in the state, and in a subsequent investment phase, to implement a second industrial plant for the separation of rare earth oxides.” The total projected investment for the two phases, according to the SDE, is 3.5 billion reais ($650 million).
For André de Lima Maia, an agricultural engineer, popular educator and state leader of the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) in Bahia, mining could bring new negative impacts to wildlife and vegetation by clearing the Caatinga dry forest, in addition to increasing land conflicts in a state already affected by land grabbing.
“It could get much worse. It could worsen the situation of land grabbing, threats, gunmen, psychological harassment — all of which are already occurring timidly,” he said. “But, as we are strugglers, we will fight for the rights of the people.”
First asbestos, now rare earths
Besides Bahia, other Brazilian states also face the prospect of rare earth mining, driven by the increasing needs of the industry and the competition with China, which has half the world reserves and almost 90% of processing capacity, giving it a huge advantage in commercial and geopolitical disputes.
Goiás, a state in Brazil’s midwestern region, is already home to powerful agribusiness companies. Ricardo Junior de Assis Fernandes Gonçalves, a geography professor at the Goiás State University (UEG), studied one of the areas that’s a particular focus for rare earth mining applications: the municipality of Minaçu. The area has historically been affected by asbestos production, and today there are 37 mining applications there and in the neighboring municipality of Montividiu do Norte.
According to Gonçalves’s most recent study, there’s already a concentration of mining operations in settlements in that part of the state, now aggravated by the expansion of critical minerals. “In the north and northeast of the state, there is a new extractive frontier that is predatory and threatens the remaining rural populations in Goiás; people who still live on the land, in a relationship with water, with crops, with their historically constituted territories,” he said.
Land disputes and environmental damage
Ítalo Kant is a member of the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT), a land-rights advocacy group affiliated with the Catholic Church. He said the arrival of these large mining projects in the neighboring state of Minas Gerais is fueling the intensification of local disputes over land and even natural resources.
“Usually, these areas already have a historical tension over land use, where family farming fights against land grabbers, gold miners, extensive livestock farming, soybean crops and, ultimately, the use of pesticides,” said Kant, who’s also a member of the National Committee in Defense of Territories against Mining. “So, with the arrival of these large mining projects, the first step is the expansion and intensification of these local disputes over land.”
If these projects are approved, he added, there’s a risk of a “community disruption, resulting from decades and decades of struggle these families have endured to gain access to this territory. If you remove these people from this territory, it’s a method of destabilizing the entire community network and breaking social and even environmental contracts.”
In yet another state, Pernambuco, in the northeast, Lenivaldo Marques da Silva Lima, a member of the local rural workers federation, Fetape, also warned of the fallout from new mining operations in rural settlements.
According to Lima, the Zona da Mata region of Pernambuco is undergoing “severe environmental changes,” with sugarcane fields being cleared for cattle and extensive livestock farming, which “is devastating the climate and the environment.” Rare earths mining in this region will worsen the situation even further, reducing the area planted with food and intensifying social problems, he added. “This will affect the production of healthy food and leave people landless. We need to fight against this.”
Responses
In Bahia, the SDE, the state development agency, said mining concessions fall under federal jurisdiction, under the responsibility of the National Mining Agency, which has not yet notified the state about the areas being explored by the company Borborema.
“It is important to emphasize that INCRA also has specific legislation (Normative Instruction 122/2021), which establishes procedures for approving the use of settlement areas for mining, energy and infrastructure projects,” the SDE said. “SDE has no stake in the project; only the company can withdraw from it. Furthermore, the project’s viability is the responsibility of the licensing agencies; therefore, only these agencies can deny it.”
In June, the Federal Public Defender’s Office (DPU) filed a Public Civil Action requesting INCRA revoke Normative Instruction 112/2021, which allows mining within rural settlements.
Borborema Mineração did not respond to requests for comment by the time this article was originally published.
This story was first published here in Portuguese by the Mining Observatory on July 2, 2025.
Surge in critical minerals claims puts Brazil’s land reform communities at risk
Banner image: A rare earths mine operated by Serra Verde Mineração in Minaçu, Goiás state, Brazil. Image by Eraldo Peres/AP Photo.
Citation:
Gonçalves, R. J. A. F., & Dumont, M. A. (2023). A mineração de amianto e o desastre permanente da minério-dependência em Minaçu, Goiás, Brasil. Élisée – Revista de Geografia da UEG, 12(01), e1212312. doi:10.31668/elisee.v12i01.14072
