Deforestation in Colombia is increasing as the armed conflict spreads into territories once controlled by the now-defunct FARC-EP until the peace agreement with the government of Juan Manuel Santos was signed in November 2016. Dissident factions now dominate the Amazon region, expanding networks rooted in the drug economy, illegal mining, cattle ranching, and unrestricted land grabbing, while the social and environmental impacts deepen with no foreseeable medium-term solution.
The State’s absence remains a constant across vast affected areas, stretching from the expansive plains of Orinoquia to the Amazonian foothills, covering the departments of Meta, Caquetá, and Guaviare. Likewise, the Andean-Amazonian borders have not escaped the effects of deforestation.
Armed colonization and deforestation in Colombia
Between 2017 and 2020, deforestation grew at a staggering rate. In the first year following the peace agreement, 216,552 hectares were impacted by uncontrolled logging. In 2016, while the national government and FARC-EP were still negotiating, deforestation was recorded at 177,765 hectares—23% lower than the figure registered in the year following the implementation of the agreements.
According to recent data from Environment Minister Susana Muhamad, “in the last quarter of 2023 and the first three months of 2024, forest loss increased by 41% and 40% respectively compared to the same periods in the previous year.” In 2024, deforestation in Colombia increased by 35% compared to 2023, with the country losing 107,000 hectares of forest, compared to the 79,256 hectares two years ago.
This increase is linked to the Central General Staff (EMC), a FARC dissident group, whose territorial control directly correlates with forest logging: the greater their armed presence, the more deforestation rises.
The EMC’s broad-spectrum operations and illegal economic infrastructure in the Amazonian region are partly due to the 2017 coca price crisis, which depressed production and reduced land used for cultivation. Deforestation followed a restructuring of the coca business, shifting to cattle ranching, which has become a new method of appropriating land, expanding the agricultural frontier, and establishing jungle routes used to move cattle, coca, minerals, and wildlife across the borders with Peru, Ecuador, and Venezuela.
The EMC has leveraged its military presence to create a coercive land-grabbing structure, with a system of taxes including extortion fees, grazing lot allocations, cattle head counts, milk quotas, property title permissions, and licenses for product sale and commercialization. Beyond economic controls, the EMC imposes political and movement restrictions on residents and acts as an authority that grants land purchase and exploitation permits to both multinational companies and local politicians or investors involved in agribusiness and illegal mining in the region.
EMC’s armed colonization of the Amazon uses land grabbing as both an economic and political instrument, using deforestation to expand illegal business and pressure the national government for political engagement within the “Total Peace” framework.
While the EMC fully participated in peace talks with the national government, deforestation rates dropped significantly. Data from early 2022 through late 2023 showed a marked deceleration in deforestation, reflecting the EMC’s political will toward peace dialogue. Now, following a breakdown in talks with certain EMC factions in the Amazon, both armed and environmental conflicts are escalating without effective government intervention.
Agricultural frontier without limits
Land ownership is a fundamental issue, with its use and exploitation left to illegal businesses profiting from these regions. This situation has been facilitated by local, regional, and national political sectors that have used their power over land titles, sanitation, cattle commerce, and more, to allow licenses for both legal and illegal capital exploitation.
In Colombia, defining the agricultural frontier and its boundaries has been a persistent challenge, especially given the land dispossession that has fueled the armed conflict. In the Amazon, the lack of clear boundaries between agricultural frontiers and protected areas puts conservation efforts and land access for farming and ethnic communities at odds with expanding economic activity.
The main conflict revolves around the expansion of the agricultural frontier into protected areas. Tensions over land use remain high, with only a limited focus on ensuring social and territorial zoning that might help resolve socio-environmental conflicts involving Indigenous, Afro-Colombian, and rural communities.
Without regulations for agribusiness, protected areas, and frontier limits, speculation over land value and usage will continue to fuel legal and illegal land accumulation, gradually consuming the Amazon’s natural reserves. This includes extensive cattle ranching, oil palm, rice, and coca crops.
Cattle ranching and land grabbing fuel deforestation in Colombia
Due to armed forces, coca, agribusiness, and land speculation, the Amazon has transformed into a cattle-ranching hub. Large cattle markets do not exist in many of these newly developed areas. Instead, cattle ranching establishes de facto land control, aligning with Colombian land-use laws.
The Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology, and Environmental Studies (IDEAM) notes that cattle ranching positively correlates with deforestation. Similarly, the Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development (FCDS) reports that “the bovine census has increased by 48% since 2016, with over 1.1 million cattle now in major Amazonian municipalities.”
This exponential rise in deforestation and cattle ranching is tied to land grabbing. However, there is insufficient data on the extent of current land acquisition, providing illegality with fertile ground to expand while regulatory institutions work to develop census tools and controls.
The National Federation of Oil Palm Growers (Fedepalma) and the Colombian Federation of Ranchers (Fedegán) contribute little to product traceability in these unregulated economies. Without State oversight or accurate land-grab data, speculation continues to fuel a cycle that could make the Amazon’s environmental crisis unsustainable.
Urgent action against deforestation
The COP 16 held last year in Colombia ended without an agreement on biodiversity funding and failed to deliver important measures or concrete initiatives to adress climate change or deforestation.
It is critical to recognize that speculative, profit-driven land use along the agricultural frontier and land ownership pressures will only intensify conflicts unless comprehensive state and institutional actions are strengthened. Without decisive measures, the environmental crisis may soon reach an irreversible point.
An integrated environmental peace initiative is urgently needed to align the efforts required for Colombia’s Total Peace. This would involve strengthening state presence to protect the Amazon, engaging in dialogue with armed actors, enacting strong public policies for territorial defense, fostering a commitment to environmental conservation, and investing in community-based conservation to help prevent the destruction of this essential ecosystem. There is still time to act.