The Amazon rainforest has been called the "lungs of the Earth," in that its trees take in carbon dioxide and give off oxygen in the photosynthesis process, more than any region on Earth. It's a vast ecosystem that is key to supporting plant and animal life globally.
Scientists are now warning that the rapid deforestation of the Amazon rainforest, the burning vast tracts of land to clear it for agriculture, has reached nearly 20% and threatens irreversible harm to the planet:
“The precious Amazon is teetering on the edge of functional destruction and, with it, so are we,” Thomas Lovejoy of George Mason University and Carlos Nobre of the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil, both of whom have studied the world’s largest rainforest for decades, wrote in an editorial in the journal Science Advances. “Today, we stand exactly in a moment of destiny: The tipping point is here, it is now.” [snip]
In interviews, Lovejoy and Nobre said they decided to sound a dire alarm about the Amazon after witnessing the acceleration of troubling trends. The combination of rising temperatures, crippling wildfires and ongoing land clearing for cattle ranching and crops has extended dry seasons, killed off water-sensitive vegetation and created conditions for more fire.
The Amazon is 17 percent deforested, but for the large portion of it inside Brazil, the figure is closer to 20 percent. The fear is that soon there will be so little forest that the trees, which not only soak up enormous quantities of rainwater but also give off mist that aids agriculture and sustains innumerable species, won’t be able to recycle enough rainfall.
At that point, much of the rainforest could decline into a drier savanna ecosystem. Rainfall patterns would change across much of South America. Several hundred billion tons of carbon dioxide could wind up in the atmosphere, worsening climate change. And such a feedback loop would be tough to reverse." (our emphasis)Brazil is governed by a far right-wing Trump knockoff, Jair Bolsonaro, whom demagogue and con man Donald "Rump" Trump has embraced, despite charges of homophobia and corruption leveled at Bolsonaro. The Brazilian leader has also brushed off the gravity of the Amazon fires, calling them "cultural" and suggesting they're inevitable. Like the U.S., actions to stop catastrophic environmental damage there and elsewhere won't be taken until the Trumps and Bolsonaros and their ilk are voted out along with their political allies.
BONUS: Fires in Brazil's rainforest aren't the only environmental disaster facing them. Crude oil sludge is washing up on its beaches too.
(photo: A fire in the Amazon basin, August 24, 2019. Victor Moriyama/Greenpeace)
