EXISTEM "BIOMAS BRASILEIROS"? O USO DO TERMO NO BRASIL E SUAS IMPLICAÇÕES PARA A CIÊNCIA E PARA A CONSERVAÇÃO DA BIODIVERSIDADE

cleber Ibraim salimon , Sandro Menezes Silva, José Marcelo torezan

The term "Biome" is widely disseminated in Brazil and is frequently used in Brazilian textbooks, supplementary educational books, scientific literature and federal, state and municipal laws. Despite the definitions brought by science for this term, which consider geographic and biotic criteria, the circumscription used for biomes in Brazil lacks a more consistent technical and scientific basis, and the nomenclature used is dissociated from the global terminology. This dissociation brings several implications, such as the difficulty in carrying out biogeographical comparisons between Brazil and other Earth's regions, the biased application of laws that use these regions as references, and the definition of conservation strategies that are more suitable to the regional realities of a megadiverse country like Brazil. This article aims to bring considerations and reflections on the use of this term in the country, pointing to its main inconsistencies and conceptual limitations, and opening the possibility that new conceptions of the term can bring improvements to both the legal framework for the protection of Brazilian biodiversity and the comparative analysis between the natural regions of Brazil and other parts of the world, especially those that share the same types of biomes.