Environmental Impact Assessment Review 95 (2022) 106801 0195-9255/© 2022 Published by Elsevier Inc. Are Environmental Impact Assessments effectively addressing the biodiversity issues in Brazil? Amanda M.S. Dias a, * , Carly Cook b , Rodrigo Lima Massara a, c , Adriano Pereira Paglia a a Laborat´ orio de Ecologia e Conservaç˜ ao, Depto de Gen´ etica, Ecologia e Evoluç˜ ao, Instituto de Ciˆ encias Biol´ ogicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil b School of Biological Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia c Instituto SerraDiCal de Pesquisa e Conservaç˜ ao, Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil A R T I C L E INFO Keywords: Environmental permit Fauna Biological data Environmental diagnosis Impact evaluation Adaptive management ABSTRACT Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is the main legal instrument for controlling the impacts of human development projects in many countries, including Brazil. However, the way biodiversity is addressed as part of the EIA process has been discussed around the world, with concerns raised about poor-quality studies and a failure to achieve evidence-based decisions. To explore these concerns, we evaluated: 1) the quality of baseline biodiversity studies used to inform EIAs; 2) the predictions made about the impacts of the development on biodiversity and their relationship to baseline studies; and 3) the relevance of the quality of these baseline studies and the predicted impacts on the decisions made by the relevant licensing agency. To do this, we collected and analyzed EIAs associated with 78 development proposals from the State of Minas Gerais in southeastern Brazil, using medium and large-sized terrestrial mammals as indicators. We found baseline studies were basic and lacking scientifc rigor, with no guiding questions or hypotheses, few ecological analyses, and that they omitted essential information about study design. The poor quality of biodiversity information in most baseline studies led to signifcant defciencies in impact reports, with inadequate descriptions of the likely impacts of de- velopments on biodiversity. Finally, we found that the shortcomings in both baseline studies and impact assessment reports had no relationship to decision-making, with poor quality EIAs still obtaining environmental licenses, which is alarming. Only in two decisions were cited some shortcoming of baseline studies as a reason for conditional approval. We conclude by providing a range of recommendations to help promote evidence-based decision-making in EIAs and improve the quality and transparency of the biodiversity data produced throughout Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and EIA. 1. Introduction The preservation of biodiversity and ecological processes are important not only because of their intrinsic value, but also to guarantee the maintenance of the ecosystem services (e.g., pollination linked to food production, climate regulation, and maintenance of air and water quality) (Alho, 2008). However, habitat loss and degradation due to human activities are leading to an ongoing decline in biodiversity globally (WWF, 2020). Brazil is a megadiverse country, yet 9.64% of fauna species evaluated are currently extinct or threatened (ICMBio, 2018). The recent history of degradation has had signifcant impacts on humans and biodiversity, with unprecedented man-made wildfres (Mega, 2020) and deforestation (INPE, 2020). Added to this, there are ongoing impacts of economic activities, such as agriculture, livestock, and mining, on eco- systems (Touma and Ramírez, 2019). In 2015 and 2019, the collapse of two large mine tailing dams in southeastern Brazil killed 289 people and destroyed over 1325 ha of forest (Omachi et al., 2018). These dam collapses also led to fsh mortality, water contamination, and accumu- lation of toxic chemicals along the food chain (Cordeiro et al., 2019; Hatje et al., 2017; Thompson et al., 2020; Vergilio et al., 2020). With many of these activities being state-sanctioned, questions have been raised about whether these impacts should have been predicted, and therefore avoided. Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) are the main legal in- strument for controlling human impacts on biodiversity in many * Corresponding author at: Av. Presidente Antˆ onio Carlos, n ◦ 6627, ICB, Bloco E3, sala 257, Pampulha, Belo Horizonte MG 31270-910, Brasil. E-mail address: amandamonik@yahoo.com.br (A.M.S. Dias). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Environmental Impact Assessment Review journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/eiar https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eiar.2022.106801 Received 21 July 2021; Received in revised form 20 January 2022; Accepted 29 April 2022