Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve, Acre

An extractive reserve (RESEX) in Brazil is a protected area where the land stays in state ownership but communities such as rubber tappers keep the right to gather forest products. According to Agência Senado, Brazil had 59 extractive reserves covering more than 12 million hectares in 2013. ICMBio, the federal agency that manages Brazil's federal conservation areas, is named after Chico Mendes.

Chico Mendes was shot at the back door of his home in Xapuri, Acre, on 22 December 1988. Rancher Darly Alves da Silva and his son Darci Alves Pereira were each sentenced to 19 years in prison, according to Agência Senado. Secondary accounts say the two escaped from prison in 1993; accounts of their recapture and release conflict.

The Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve was created on 12 March 1990, fifteen months after his death. The record gives its area as about 970,570 hectares across four municipalities.

In 2019 the reserve lost 74.5 km² of forest, about three times the average of the previous five years, according to Mongabay. Five ICMBio staff supervised the reserve at the time, and cattle were present on 97% of the parcels examined, more than 50,000 head in all. On 6 November 2019 Environment Minister Ricardo Salles met five people accused of environmental violations in the reserve; according to the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, he was receptive to their demands to shrink the boundaries and loosen enforcement. In the same period a bill was introduced in the legislature to remove 190 km² (about 2%) from the reserve.

By 2023 pasture covered 11% of the reserve (105,000 hectares), and clearing rose by 30% in 2024. The record says Brazil-nut income is seasonal and informal, that families keep cattle as savings, and that some sell their plots illegally to ranchers.