Barão de Cocais dam: FGV to manage region’s Income Transfer Program
Remediation plan will benefit around 10,000 residents who were harmed by the critical emergency state of Upper-Southern Dam.

Fundação Getulio Vargas has been selected to manage an Income Transfer Program in the region of Barão de Cocais, Minas Gerais, as part of a socially and environmentally significant agreement involving mining company Vale, the Minas Gerais State Public Defender’s Office, the state and federal public prosecutors’ offices and the Archdiocese of Mariana. The program will be similar to one implemented in Brumadinho.
Barão de Cocais is home to Upper-Southern Dam, a tailings dam administered by Vale, which was deactivated in 2018 due to the risk of a breach. This state of emergency led to the evacuation of some of the town’s people, generating a high impact on the routines of residents and the local economy. The reparation and compensation plan consists of three quarterly payments to residents who were harmed by the partial evacuation of the region. This collective compensation will benefit the region’s residents, classified into three groups: people in the high-risk area, people in the medium-risk area, and people registered with Cadastro Único, a national database of low-income people.
The program’s initiatives are scheduled to begin in March. “Following the court’s approval, we’ll start working with the population. The first step is to identify and register the local residents, then calculate the amount and make the benefit payments,” explains André Andrade, executive manager of FGV Projetos. In total, around R$126 million will be transferred to the community, and the payments are expected to be completed by the end of 2024.
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