In the Brazilian Amazon, the state of Mato Grosso has the highest rates of deforestation; which is concentrated over “hotspots” mainly located along the BR 163 and BR 158 highways. At present, these and other regions are facing a second phase of occupation in which the profitability of logging and farming activities promotes the expansion and transformation of the frontier. This process is being reinforced by government investment programs for infrastructure projects. According to the PRODES project, the total deforestation in Mato Grosso between 2003 and 2004 was 10615 km2 which represents 40% of the total deforestation activity in Amazônia in this period. In order to facilitate the study and understanding of the complexity of deforestation and its related land cover change, spatial modeling is a potentially useful approach that represents, in a simple way, complex processes, like deforestation and simulates future scenarios. The objective of this study is to develop a spatial model to simulate deforestation dynamics at different spatial scales in the northeast region of the state Mato Grosso up to the year 2025, as well to evaluate the response of deforestation to proximate variables through development of future scenarios. For this research the spatial simulation model DINAMICA is used with its concepts and techniques based on cellular automata and weights of evidence. For the northeastern region of the state of Mato Grosso a spatial resolution of 250m was used and three scenarios are simulated: the first scenario represented the historical tendencies (business as usual) of deforestation, the results show that if the present tendencies persist until the year 2025 70% of the area of the northeast region of Mato Grosso will be deforested, having a highly fragmented landscape. In the second scenario represented effective actions of the federal, state and municipal governments that reduce the region’s deforestation rates for a prolonged period. This action would reduce the deforestation rate by 9% up to the year 2025, and the landscape would have less fragmentation and more connectivity between forest fragments. In scenario 3, in addition to the effective action of the governments, the creation of new conservation units planned by the state government was included. The conservation of these areas would reduce the deforestation rate by 10% up to the year 2025 and the region’s landscape would consist of larger forest patches, protecting the principal headwaters of the Xingu River. A second model was developed for the municipality União do Sul, applying a spatial resolution of 90 meters. Four scenarios were simulated up to the year 2025 in three of which the state government imposes a deforestation quota per year for each municipality. The first scenario involves the continuation of present deforestation trends and indicates the loss of almost 50% of the total forested area in the municipality, having a highly fragmented landscape in the year 2025. The other three scenarios represent the creation of new conservation areas and the application of deforestation quotas of 20%, 50% and 80%; the results show an increase in the percentage of deforested area and a less fragmented landscape for the low quotas in the year 2025.
