How long have environmentalists been campaigning against the deforestation of Amazonia? For a very long time. Yet what has been the achievement. Apart from well-intentioned words, not too much, it appears.
A total of 11,088 sq km (4,281 sq miles) of rainforest were destroyed from August 2019 to July 2020, a vast expanse seven times larger than Greater London. This is a 9.5% increase from the previous year, its highest level since 2008.
Carlos Rittl, a Brazilian environmentalist who works at Germany’s Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies, said the numbers were “humiliating, shameful and outrageous”
The Amazon is a vital carbon store that slows down the pace of global warming. The billions of trees are a vast store of carbon and, without them, the rise in global temperatures will accelerate. It is home to about three million species of plants and animals, and one million indigenous people.
Scientists say it has suffered losses at an accelerated rate since Jair Bolsonaro took office in January 2019. The Brazilian president has encouraged agriculture and mining activities in the world's largest rainforest. This is done to create fields for cattle grazing and soya cultivation - big earners for Brazil. In addition to encouraging development in the rainforest, Bolsonaro has also cut funding to federal agencies that have the power to fine and arrest farmers and loggers breaking environmental law. Bolsonaro has previously clashed with Inpe over its deforestation data. Last year, he accused the agency of smearing Brazil's reputation. None of this should be a surprise: Jair Bolsonaro, was elected on a promise of development. Keen to promote mining as well as agriculture, he described the Amazon as "a periodic table" of valuable minerals, and he resents what he sees as outside interference.
Brazilian non-governmental organisation Climate Observatory said the figures "reflect the result of a successful initiative to annihilate the capacity of the Brazilian State and the inspection bodies to take care of our forests and fight crime in the Amazon".
Cristiane Mazzetti, a Greenpeace spokesperson for the Amazon, said, “These numbers show us that we are continuing to move in the wrong direction than the one needed to deal with the climate emergency and the biodiversity crisis.”
Brazil's Amazon: Deforestation 'surges to 12-year high' - BBC News
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