Commentary On the impact of the Brazilian Forest Code on mangroves: A comment to Ferreira and Lacerda (2016) Ronaldo Ruy de Oliveira-Filho a, * , Andr  e Scarlate Rovai b , Ricardo Palamar Menghini c , Clemente Coelho Júnior d , Yara Schaeffer Novelli e , Gilberto Cintr  on f a Instituto de Ci^ encias do Mar, Universidade Federal do Cear a, Avenida da Aboliç~ ao 3207, Meireles, Fortaleza, CE 60165-081, Brazil b Departamento de Ecologia e Zoologia, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Brazil c Centro Universit ario das Faculdades Metropolitanas Unidas, Brazil d Instituto de Ci^ encias Biol ogicas, Universidade de Pernambuco, Brazil e Instituto Oceanogr afico, Universidade de S~ ao Paulo, Brazil f Instituto BiomaBrasil, Brazil article info Article history: Received 20 June 2016 Accepted 4 August 2016 Keywords: Mangrove ecosystems Environmental laws Brazilian Forest Code On their essay Ferreira and Lacerda (2016) provided a compre- hensive overview on the “Degradation and conservation of Brazil- ian mangroves, status and perspectives”, ranging from anthropogenic to climate change driven impacts. Although these authors discuss to some extent the legislation body concerning the regulation of coastal resources, they overlooked the menaces to mangrove ecosystems resulting from recent amendments to the Brazilian Forest Code (BFC) (Brasil, 2012). The revision of the BFC was strongly biased towards agribusiness interests. As such, it has been target of countless rebuttals from the scientific community (to name a few, see Metzger et al., 2010; Michalski et al., 2010; Pagliosa et al., 2012; Rovai et al., 2012; Schaeffer-Novelli et al., 2012; Queiroz et al., 2013). In addition, since its promulgation four unconstitu- tional acts against many articles present in the BFC have been proposed by the Ministry of Public Affairs, and supported by po- litical parties, social organizations, and the academy. Here we add to Ferreira and Lacerda discussion (Ferreira and Lacerda, 2016) highlighting the main issues of the biggest down- grading, downsizing, and degazettement of protected areas (sensu Mascia and Pailler, 2011) in Brazil since its discovery in the early 1500's. First, although the BFC defines “mangroves in all of its ex- tensions” as Areas of Permanent Preservation (APP) it fails in not recognizing the resilience of mangrove ecosystems and their alternate states (Holling, 1973). The term “mangrove ecosystem” refers to a tidally influenced wetland complex including pro- gradational sand or mud flats, mangrove forests and salt marshes, hypersaline lagoons, intertidal flats including: salt flats, salt pans, salinas, salt barrens, apicuns, tannes and coastal sabkhas. These landscape elements represent alternate states in response to ever- changing coastlines resulting from sea level transgressive- regressive sequences, variation in sediment yield, and subsidence (Woodroffe et al., 2016). Mangrove ecosystems often contain these landscape elements but most legislation mistakenly only cover wooded component. The amended BFC granted up to 35% of all salt flats (locally called “apicum”) along Brazil's coastline to be con- verted into shrimp ponds (Pagliosa et al., 2012; Rovai et al., 2012). Considering the expected landward colonization by mangroves as a response of rising sea levels, salt flats are the last ecosystem resource in terms of space to persist during these transitional pe- riods (Alongi, 2008; Gilman et al., 2008). In other words, the BFC regulated conversion of salt flats areas will eliminate mangrove's intrinsic adaptive capacity to cope with climate changes, resulting in positive land-atmosphere feedbacks (i.e., increase in CO 2 emis- sions). Second, the BFC fails in recognizing the restoration potential of mangroves forests, allowing further intervention in places where the mangrove ecological function is impaired (Article 8 th ). It has long been proved that effective mangrove restoration can be easily achieved by eliminating environmental stressors (Dale et al., 2014 and references therein). A large body of scientific evidence now shows that after the appropriate hydrological conditions are restored, mangroves can fully develop and function as natural (i.e., * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: ronaldo.ruy@gmail.com (R.R. Oliveira-Filho), asrovai@gmail. com (A.S. Rovai), ricardo.menghini@biomabrasil.org (R.P. Menghini), clemente. coelhojr@biomabrasil.org (C. Coelho Júnior), novelliy@usp.br (Y. Schaeffer Novelli), gilcintron@earthlink.net (G. Cintr on). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Ocean & Coastal Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ocecoaman http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2016.08.002 0964-5691/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Ocean & Coastal Management 132 (2016) 36e37