Reserves, Research Stations and Nurseries

Plant Nursery · SOLUTIONS FOR RIPARIAN REFORESTATION AND URBAN TREE PLANTING

A broad based program is being conducted around Cemig’s reservoirs and their tributary rivers in an effort to preserve their banks, reduce erosive effects, improve the local landscape and provide wildlife with suitable shelter and feeding conditions. Moreover, the Company maintains an Urban Tree Planting Program in partnership with the various Municipalities in an attempt to ensure the compatibility of the local flora with the electrical grid.

In order to supply Cemig’s partnership programs with the public and private sectors, a modern laboratory for the collection, storage and processing of forestry seeds is operated by the company in Belo Horizonte and supplies two forestry nurseries which have a combined production capacity of 450,000 seedlings a year.

Related Activities – Destination and Results

The decision to establish forestry nurseries was based on the need to supply the company’s environmental programs with quality seedlings, produced in strategic locations in the interior of the state.

Urban Tree Planting Program: in this program, seeds and seedlings of species suitable to urban settings from an environmental, as well as aesthetic and technical point of view are used. When trees are planted without proper technical planning, they may cause accidents during storms and they currently represent the second largest cause of disruptions to the energy supply.

Cemig’s forestry nursery laboratory is capable of storing 1.2 million tons of seeds. The laboratory supplies associated Municipalities, public forestry nurseries as well as environmental and research institutes with urban-tree-planting kits on an annual basis.

In addition to seeds and seedlings, Cemig also supplies associated Municipalities and the community at large with an Urban Tree Management Manual that contains information on the adequate environmental planning, execution and maintenance in urban settings.

Riparian Reforestation and Degraded Area Reclamation Program: For this program, the seedling nurseries, following the research guidelines that were developed over 10 years ago, jointly by Cemig and Universidade Federal de Lavras, produce a wide variety of arboreal and herbaceous plant species.

After being chosen according to local characteristics, several species are then designated to be transplanted along the reservoir banks that lack riparian coverage. The riparian forests are constituted of species adapted to the soil moisture resulting from the level of both the water table and the fluctuations of the reservoir.

By 1999, Cemig’s Forestry Program had allowed for the reclamation of over 520 hectares of degraded areas and the recomposing of 858 hectares of riparian forests, including 283 kilometers along the perimeters of the company’s reservoirs. More than 134 rural properties and companies in 23 municipalities have benefited from the program.

Cemig’s Forestry Nurseries are located at the Itutinga Environmental Station, close to the city of Lavras, and the Volta Grande Environmental Station, situated in the municipality of Conceição das Alagoas, near Uberaba.