The Serra do Gandarela is a natural sanctuary about from Belo Horizonte. Serra do Gandarela National Park covers parts of the municipalities of Caeté, Itabirito, Mariana, Nova Lima, Ouro Preto, Rio Acima and Santa Bárbara in the state of Minas Gerais. Part of the park is in the Belo Horizonte metropolitan region. The park has an area of. The park is in the Atlantic Forest biome. It holds the largest intact remnant of Atlantic Forest in Minas Gerais, mostly in excellent condition. Waters from the Serra do Gandarela feed the basins of the Das Velhas River, a tributary of the São Francisco River, the Piracicaba River and the Doce River. The Das Velhas provides more than 60% of the water for Belo Horizonte and 45% of the water for the metropolitan region. The water is clean and requires little treatment. The Serra do Gandarela contains over 100 caves. Some support unique species, and some contain archaeological sites.
History
At the request of a number of civil organisations the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation prepared a proposal for creating the park, protecting a large part of the Belo Horizonte water sources, which were seriously threatened by mining for iron ore. The original proposal in 2010 was to protect an area of, but this was reduced before the park was created. Public discussions about the project were started on 10 April 2012. The park was created by federal decree on 13 October 2014. The decree also added over to the Médio Juruá Extractive Reserve in Amazonas and created the Guaricana National Park in Paraná and the Nascentes Geraizeiras Sustainable Development Reserve in Minas Gerais. The national park is classed as IUCN protected area category II. The purpose is to preserve samples of biological, geological, speleological and hydrological heritage associated with the Quadrilátero Ferrífero formations, including alpine meadows, remnants of semi-deciduous forest, aquifer recharge areas and the scenery of mountains, plateaus, rivers, waterfalls and natural vegetation. The park boundaries did not satisfy the requests of the social organisations who had been consulted, since it did not fully protect the geological formations holding the water supply aquifers. The area of Vale's R$4 billon Apollo iron ore project was excluded. On the other hand, the park included areas traditionally used by the surrounding communities, causing potential conflict. Roberto Vizentin, president of ICMBio, defended the reduction from and the high risk of pollution from mining as a necessary compromise given the relatively low Human Development Index in the region.
Fauna
The Iron Quadrangle, where the park is located, is a transition region between the biomasses of the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado, which contributes to increase species diversity, the presence of typical species of the two biomasses. Among the animal species that live in the park are theː chaco eagle, cinereous warbling finch, cougar, brown howler, tayra, margay, collared peccary, masked titi, maned wolf , southern tamandua, long-nosed armadillo and jaguar.
