ENVIRONMENTAL SAND LICENSING IN FOCUS: AN ANALYSIS OF THE SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES OF CLANDESTINATE SAND EXTRACTION

Abstract

This article addresses environmental licensing in Brazil, delving deeper into the reality of illegal sand extraction and its harmful impacts on the environment and society. The paper seeks to answer the following question: "What are the socio-environmental impacts caused by illegal sand extraction in Brazil?" To answer this question, the following research objective was defined: to analyze environmental licensing as a state mechanism for implementing sustainable sand mining. To achieve this objective, bibliographic and documentary methodology and the inductive method were used to address the problem at hand. The work is organized as follows: the study is structured in four sections: the first is the introduction; the second section addresses the methodology; the third section conceptualizes environmental licensing and its essential aspects; then, the sand mineral is introduced and its environmental licensing process is explained; later, a discussion on the illegality of sand extraction is held, explaining how it occurs and identifying the environmental and social impacts that clandestine mining has on society; and finally, the last section, section four, contains the concluding remarks.