In 2007, Vale established the Iron Quadrangle Biodiversity Research and Conservation Center (CeBio) in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. Based on a site of around 600 hectares, CeBio manages Vale’s private nature reserves and carries out research into the restoration of areas altered by mining.
CeBio conducts research and other work in the following areas: the selection and geo-referencing of “donor trees”; the collection, processing and storage of seeds; and the production of saplings and other organic materials.
The center also carries out environmental activities for visitors from neighboring communities and elsewhere, especially school children. The aim of this is to contribute to students’ environmental education and provide them with information about the region’s vegetation.
CeBio is developing various botanical collections in the Iron Quadrangle region. These include a herbarium (produced by cataloging and preserving leaves, flowers and fruits from the most important plants in the Cerrado and Atlantic Forest biomes); a seed bank (a collection of seeds of the most common species in the region); a xylotheque (a collection of small sections of the trunks of various regional tree species); and a collection of fruits of the most important plant species.
Everything collected by CeBio can be seen at any time, through the research center’s database. In this way, Vale is helping to catalog as well as preserve the region’s environmental heritage.