Deforestation
fires are surging in the Amazon, eliminating more square kilometers of
rainforest this year than they have since 2009. In the Brazilian Amazon,
fires are a common means of clearing the land -- land that is worth five times
more without the forest than with the forest -- for cattle and soy fields.
Brazil is the world’s leading exporter of beef and soy, but there’s also a high
demand for these goods domestically.
There are preservation laws still on the books in Brazil,
but Bolsonaro’s cut funding for their enforcement. Spending on forest inspection in 2020 is less
than a third of what it was in 2019. Part of the Amazon can be reforested but
time is critical: scientists estimate that once more than 20% of the rainforest
is gone, recovery won't be possible and the Amazon will go into a process of
savanization.
Brazil's Amazon rainforest suffers worst fires in
a decade
Satellites record 61% rise in hotspots over September
2019
Scientist warns: ‘It could get worse if the drought
continues’
Reuters in
Brasîlia
Thu 1 Oct
2020 16.48 BSTLast modified on Thu 1 Oct 2020 17.05 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/01/brazil-amazon-rainforest-worst-fires-in-decade
Fires in
Brazil’s Amazon increased 13% in the first nine months of the year compared
with a year ago, as the rainforest region experiences its worst rash of blazes
in a decade, data from space research agency Inpe has shown.
Satellites
in September recorded 32,017 hotspots in the world’s largest rainforest, a 61%
rise from the same month in 2019.
In August
last year, surging fires in the Amazon captured global headlines and prompted
criticism from world leaders such as France’s Emmanuel Macron that Brazil was
not doing enough to protect the rainforest.
On Tuesday,
the US Democratic presidential candidate, Joe Biden, called for a world effort
to offer $20bn to end Amazon deforestation and threatened Brazil with
unspecified “economic consequences” if it did not “stop tearing down the
forest”.
President
Jair Bolsonaro lambasted Biden’s comment as a “cowardly threat” to Brazil’s
sovereignty and a “clear sign of contempt”.
Data from
Inpe released on Thursday showed that in 2019, fires spiked in August and
declined considerably the month after, but this year’s peak has been more
sustained. Both August and September of 2020 have matched or surpassed last
year’s single-month high.
“We have
had two months with a lot of fire. It’s already worse than last year,” said Ane
Alencar, science director for Brazil’s Amazon Environmental Research Institute
(Ipam).
“It could
get worse if the drought continues. We are at the mercy of the rain.”
The Amazon
is experiencing a more severe dry season than last year, which scientists
attribute in part to warming in the tropical North Atlantic Ocean pulling
moisture away from South America.
The entire
Amazon, which spans nine countries, currently has 28,892 active fires,
according to a fire monitoring tool funded in part by the US space agency,
Nasa.
The fires
in September are not only burning recently deforested areas and farmland, where
ranchers set them to clear land, but are also increasingly burning virgin
forest, a worrying trend that suggests the rainforest is becoming drier and
more prone to fire.
Roughly 62%
of major Amazon fires were in forests in September, compared with only 15% in
August, according to an analysis of satellite images by the US-based non-profit
Amazon Conservation.
The warming
of the North Atlantic is also helping drive drought in the Brazilian Pantanal,
the world’s largest wetland, which has suffered more fires this year than ever
previously recorded, according to Inpe data.
A Federal
University of Rio de Janeiro analysis found that 23% of the wetlands, which are
home to the densest population of jaguars in the world, has burned.
“Brazil is
on fire,” said Cristiane Mazzetti, a forest campaigner for advocacy group
Greenpeace Brasil, in a statement.
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