CASE STUDY:

The Shrinking Rainforests

Twenty years after the goal of rescuing the Amazon rain forest first captured world attention, deforestation

and the burning of vast territories

are again climbing.

Nineteen percent of the forests and woodlands

in South America have been lost,

with most of the recent losses occurring in and along the margins of the Amazon

rainforest.

Ecological concerns related to the burning of theAmazon forest include:

• an increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere

• the loss of species

• the reduction in biodiversity in one of the most biologically diverse parts of the world.

A new report by the Brazilian congressional committee

investigating foreign logging companies

estimates that the Amazon is being lost at a

rate of 20,000 square miles a year, three times

the previous estimate.

For at least the last hundred years,

humans have cleared forests

to create either grazing lands or

croplands.

It is important to realize that these croplands and

pastures are the basis of subsistence for the

developing countries of the Western Hemisphere.

What is known from

satellite analysis proves

that deforestation is occurring

over a larger area

than previously estimated.

The next slide was taken from

a satellite photograph over the region of Rhondonia,

Brazil.

The extensive logging operations

can be seen, as well as cleared sections for crops, and smoke from slash and

burn agricultural practices.

This more distant satellite image of the same area shows sections of the

rainforest almost totally barren due to clear-cutting

practices of logging companies.

1992

A more dramatic vision of the tremendous changes in

Rhondonia can be seen by looking at

false-color images from satellites.

The following image is of the

same region in the mid 1970s. The red color indicates

heavy growth of rainforest vegetation, with a small road

running along the rivers.

1975

Less than 20 years later, the next false-color image of the same region shows logging damage and the establishment of a logging town.

The acres of rainforest logged is equal to the size of the state of Connecticut!

1987

This epoch of deforestation was even government

subsidized;principally by the

construction of the road that assisted with the spread of forest clearing.

It was the Brazilian government's intention to encourage agricultural expansion

in the Amazon and thereby solve a rapidly growing urban population

problem.

The slogan was: for the people without land, here is land without people.

The demand in Europe and the United States

for hardwoods like mahogany,

used for furniture, has ushered in large

illegal logging operations throughout the Amazon.

New research from the region strongly suggests that fires are also rapidly becoming as great a threat to the

biological integrity of the Amazon as is deforestation.

The state of the world's rain forests is particularly

distressing now that global warming has again become a major

concern.

Growing forests help absorb the gases that warm the

atmosphere.

Burning those

forests, of course, adds

to the problem.

Fires are set in the

Amazon to burn off

primary forest and

also to burn old cattle pastures.

Eco-tourism, logging, illegal mining

and government inaction are also responsible

for invasions of indigenous lands and a near doubling

of diseases affecting Indians.

Increased fatalities from

common diseases

such as flu, colds,

tuberculosis and measles

are devastating indigenous

tribes.

The government appears caught between international pressure to reduce the amount of burning and deforestation, and the influence ofpowerful domestic lobbies from the logging industry, farmers and large landholders.

Lacking enforcement muscle,

the government environmental agency ultimately collects very few of the fines it imposes.

In a recent interview, the President of Brazil acknowledged that the agency needed more money and muscle.

As part of the United States’ overall effort

to reduce the threats of global climate change,

the U.S. donated $30 million dollars

to fund preservation of the Brazilian rainforest.

The money helped launch an international fund

of seven industrialized countries, which is

coordinated by the government of Brazil.

The Amazon, responsible for maintenance

of global ecological systems,

will be lost within 50 years

if current trends

continue.

CASE STUDY:

The Shrinking Rainforests

of Brazil

Source:U.S. Geological Survey,NASA Earth Observatory