There are no real parameters with which to assess the real economic loss caused by desertification in Brazil. But based on methods applied by the UN in Africa, the Environment Minister estimates that just the productivity losses alone will exceed U$ 300 million a year. This is a estimate that even the Co-ordinator of the National Plan to Combat Desertification himself, Heitor Matallo Júnior, realises is somewhat imprecise. He states that the African soil has different characteristics to our own which compromise the calculation base used in the survey. "These values need to be re-appraised, taking the specific context of Latin America into account", he observes.

Biologist and archaeologist Maurício Aroucha, who is studying the occurrence of the problem in the region around the Cabrobó desertification centre, believes, that in practice the losses are far greater. According to UN research, the annual losses in areas of pasture land are U$ 7.00 per hectare, U$ 50.00 in dryland farming areas and U$ 250.00 in irrigated areas. "If all the costs are taken into account, both of investment made during plantation, and of the loss of productivity, the total amount of money wasted in the semiarid Northeast will exceed the UN figures" the biologist maintains.

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