Why Is the Amazon Rain Forest Disappearing?

https://time.com/amazon-rainforest-disappearing/

by rblion • 7 years ago

110 86 7 years ago

basicplus2• 7 years ago

Yes the Amazon rainforrest is nearly gone and it should have been protected better but also all other countries forrests should have been protected, for example where there were massive forrests across europe that were destroyed centuries ago for building things like towns, cathedrals and castles and for firewood.. these should be at least in some significant part re-grown.

FooHentai• 7 years ago

destroyed centuries ago for building things like towns, cathedrals and castles and for firewood

Agree with your point entirely but also want to mention that the motivation behind not re-growing is land-clearing for reasons not stated i.e. farmland, transport infrastructure, housing. The use of wood for building materials and even firewood is carbon neutral if appropriately managed, it's those specific motivations to keep the land cleared that have led to an overall draw-down of forest cover. You can't restore cover without addressing the motivations for clearing it, and use of wood for building/heat is a bit of a red herring in that sense.

_iyig• 7 years ago

"Two decades after its fall, the border between East and West Germany would become Europe's biggest nature reserve: an 858-mile "ecological treasure trove", no longer the Iron Curtain but the Green Belt, and home to more than 600 rare and endangered species of birds, mammals, plants and insects."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Green_Belt

Merrill2• 7 years ago

The area around Chernobyl is another example. If you get rid of people, the ecosystem recovers pretty rapidly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Without_Us

bamboozled• 7 years ago

Also there is nothing stopping developed nations from protecting what they have already and actually regenerating forests.

I guess most people in Western Democracies are more worried about what everyone else is doing while our own politician ruin everything.

kortilla• 7 years ago

Not really. At least not in the US. Deforestation is pretty heavily controlled.

justinmk• 7 years ago

If the world cares about it then the world should pay for it. Not sanctions, nor sanctimony. Buy the land.

It would be expensive, but that just reflects the value to the people you're buying it from. And it's an actual, concrete action that can be taken, instead of the vague global warming solutions that just tweak domestic parameters and send tax money to the black hole of the state budget.

throwaway66920• 7 years ago

What happens when you buy the land and then people burn it down anyway and steal it back?

WilliamEdward2• 7 years ago

I presume buying the rights to the land also gives you the rights to stop these people with force.

manigandham4• 7 years ago

Buying the land doesn't do anything unless its protected by armed forces.

javert4• 7 years ago

I'm pretty sure Brazil would be delighted to receive a regular check from the rest of the world in exchange for defending part of the rainforest. As long as they get their cut, they're going to be happy. Just make the payments conditional on the continued protection of the forest; otherwise they can be expected to renege eventually.

This is exactly what it means to "buy property," by the way: nobody else can use it and the government enforces that if necessary using men with guns. So what I'm suggesting is only a slight refinement of the normal and expected arrangement when buying property.

Mobius01• 7 years ago

This argument is entirely pointless. You’re proposing to purchase land - crucial natural resource - from a sovereign nation(s). I can’t begin to imagine what a fair price would be, if there is such a thing. 300 trillion dollars? Who would pay? The rich nation taxpayers? Would the population of these benefactors countries be happy with increased taxation for no direct impact in their lives? Private investors? What would they recoup their investment from,, “responsible” exploration of the land they are ostensibly saving? Not to mention the political and cultural implications of attempting to buy a resource from a nation, after the purchasers have used up their own for economical and geopolitical gain. I ask for forgiveness if the tone of this message is overly cynical, but we are past the point of thought exercises over the fate of this planet.

If a solution to preserve the Amazon is to be found, that will involve helping Brazil rise above the cesspool of corruption that its been steeped in for the past decades. Assistance with education and economic incentives for alternatives to heavy reliance on beef and grain exports. Heavy tariffs or outright ban of these products on the international markets. Punish the large agricultural and cattle business that are decimating the forest for gain, give the people alternatives for subsistence. Until that happens, little will change.

WilliamEdward2• 7 years ago

Land has been bought before on this scale and for quite cheap, see: Alaska, Louisiana.

chaostheory5• 7 years ago

It’s not a pointless argument if voters agree. Nations don’t necessarily have to buy the land, but regular payments to Brazil to give them a reason to maintain the rain forest as opposed to burning it is a reasonable proposal. It’s better than just complaining about it.

ptah• 7 years ago

are you implying that foreigners are not allowed to buy land in brazil?

wavefunction• 7 years ago

It would be expensive

It's just Brazilian farmland, I don't see why it will be expensive. It looks like the conservative cost of a productive acre of farmland in Brazil can cost up to 1500 USD an acre, so taking the 2.124 million miles^2 area of the Amazon basin we get a very conservative 2.03T USD to purchase every acre of the Amazon basin at generous upper-end of Brazilian agricultural prices regardless of productivity.

The real problem is... how could you trust Bolsonaro's government or the criminals they've enabled and emboldened to respect your property rights?

zanny2• 7 years ago

how could you trust Bolsonaro's government or the criminals they've enabled and emboldened to respect your property rights?

In the same way the US Midwest is still not sovereign French territory after the US bought it, whoever bought the Amazon would take the role in defending it as their own turf. Which would mean garrisoning armed forces to protect the borders.

It would definitionally have to be a secession of the territory from Brazil, and it would probably just be cheaper to assassinate the government of Brazil and replace it with a puppet dictatorship beholden to foreign interests, which is something the US is extremely good at.

winter_blue• 7 years ago

Sanctions are a lot more cost effective.

Although I’d rather prefer that well-run countries (like Canada for instance) take poorly-run countries (like India or Brazil) into a form of “stewardship” of sorts. This would essentially involve first invading and annexing those countries and turning them into “protectorates” of sorts — but it would differ from old colonialism in the sense that the “steward” nation would not be exploiting the country it’s taken into its stewardship, but only ensuring that they’re run smoothly, fairly, and justly.

neotek• 7 years ago

but it would differ from old colonialism in the sense that the “steward” nation would not be exploiting the country it’s taken into its stewardship

If only it were that simple and some human beings weren't inherently bad people.

fiblye• 7 years ago

Buying land owned by another country means diddly. All it takes is one politician or motivated company to declare the contract void, and that happening is merely a matter of time.

You’d need to buy it and split it off as a country and be prepared to defend it as such and pray that the locals are willing to be absorbed by your new government. The cost of that is several magnitudes larger than merely buying land.

TearsInTheRain• 7 years ago

Eh, even nations can't just declare contracts void without serious repercussions. Nations have credit ratings too and frequently utilize international financing

alistproducer22• 7 years ago

I find it hard to take news outlets seriously on this subject when they keep the kid gloves on concerning the current president of Brazil. The reticence to call his "victory" what it really was: a coup. The intercept [0] laid out the fact that his opponent, who was slated to win in a landslide, was jailed and convicted by a judge who was working in concert with the prosecutor to ensure a conviction. If the aim was to do real journalism and speak truth to power, then outlets would call if like it is and convey zero legitimacy to the current administration.

[0] https://theintercept.com/series/secret-brazil-archive/

29athrowaway2• 7 years ago

It was not a coup.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Car_Wash

ndespres• 7 years ago

Sure seems like a coup if you look at the behavior of prosecutors colluding to jail their opposition's leaders on trumped up charges.

tehjoker2• 7 years ago

The judge that presided over Lava Jato has been shown to be completely corrupt via the disclosure of his Telegram directions to the prosecutors, which completely violates judicial neutrality. The Intercept Brazil has been covering this story.

https://theintercept.com/2019/06/15/watch-glenn-greenwald-ex...

edit: corrected WhatsApp to Telegram.

https://theintercept.com/2019/06/09/brazil-lula-operation-ca...

devoply• 7 years ago

When you look at these situations you have to realize it may be the case that the victims are criminals. The question is of the lesser evil, as there are no absolutes in such countries... or really any country. American elites often exploit 3rd world countries for unheard of gains, just look at Cheney and Rumsfeld, and Bush and the gains they made off war. In 3rd world countries they often exploit the country itself.

gchamonlive3• 7 years ago

Judge colludes with prossecution

Judge sends political adversary to prison

Judge now minister in current administration, arguably in power due to his imprisoning the aforementioned political adversary

hu34• 7 years ago

I agree, it wasn't a coup.

Lula, who will soon answer for even more corruption charges, was judged by 3 tiers of Brazil's law system, including their "Supreme Court".

Just ask yourselves: why would the owner of Odebrecht, a company that had a revenue of 45 billion USD in 2018, confess under oath that his company had corrupt deals with Lula's party when Lula was the party leader?

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-39194395

The Intercept is only releasing small disconnected parts of the recordings that can be milked for clicks. They never released in full and don't plan to. Moro already asked The Intercept to release the conversations in full, in vain it seems.

moroisahero• 7 years ago

I, as a brazilian, find it hard to take your comment seriously.

First of all, judge Moro is a national hero, and recent polls still show him as the most admired public figure in the country. Leading operation Car Wash, he was responsible to (finally!) jail many of the most powerful politics and businessman in Brasil, due to disgusting corruption and shameless kickback schemes. All his convictions were backed by mountains and mountains of evidence, and upheld in at least 3 different upper courts, including our Supreme Court. There were more than 100 convictions from politics from the entire political spectrum by Judge Moro, from right to left.

Operation Car Wash has already recovered more than 8 Billion in assets stolen from public companies.

"His opponent" that you mentioned is President Lula, today recognized as the leader of a criminal organization that stole literally billions from Brazil. He currently serves a sentence from receiving a penthouse as bribe (there are even pictures of him inside the apartment, and the owner of the building company that built it testified about the whole scheme).

Trust me, jailing him was not easy, giving the enormous support he had due to him (or his political party) being in power from 2003-2016 (btw, during this time they also managed to destroy our economy - we'll end this decade as the worst in economical terms of the last 120 years).

The are other 8 criminal lawsuits against former president Lula, and he has already been convicted (by a different Judge) in another one about "the ranch in Atibaia", which he also denied being his, even tough prosecution proved it was actually received by him as bribe: the place had paddle boats with the names of his grandsons, the master bedroom had all his wife's medicines on the counter top and even dinner tables had their names engraved, there were even regular e-mails from the manager of the ranch to the president updating him with the most detailed events... there's a 20 page PDF by our FBI with pictures of all the evidence.

About the alleged collusion between Judge Moro and the prosecution, you just need to read the Intercept messages by yourself to see that absolutely nothing wrong happened there. It's normal for the Judge to talk with the prosecution in a criminal case, as he needs to collect opinions before his rulings.

What happened in Brazil is that a "crazy judge" and some "crazy prosecutors" decided to change the "status quo" and finally put an end to the shameless multi-billion stealing that was going on for the last decade, lead by former president Lula and his political associates. If you think these Judges and Prosecutors would achieve those results without a lot of backing from the public opinion, you must only be naive. Some of those messages show exactly that: Judge and Prosecutor talking about how shadowy manouvers to discredit the operation needed to be brought to light so the public could protest and react and prevent them. Extra credit to them for doing that and going the extra mile, all within the law.

After President Bolsonaro was elected, he invited Judge Moro to talk, and he accepted to leave the Judiciary Branch to serve as Minister of Justice, and he'll probably be appointed to be a Supreme Court Justice when the next position opens (Bolsonaro will be able to appoint 2 seats during his term, during to retirements). Props to Bolsonaro for doing that.

After all these messages came out between Moro and Prosecution were published (all criminally obtained by a Hacker, I must point out), Judge Moro put it best: "parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus".

Merrill2• 7 years ago

If you look at the State of Amazonas, Brazil on Google maps satellite view, it appears to be largely untouched. Rondonia and Matto Grosso are the states most affected by deforestation. Other large parts of the Amazon rain forest in other states of Brazil and in Peru, Colombia and Venezuela are also intact. Don't take Time's word for it - go look yourself.

mac01021• 7 years ago

The claim in the article is that the deforestation is approaching 20% of the original forest and that, once that number reaches 20-25%, the water cycle will be disrupted in a way that will transform the majority of the remaining forest into savanna.

This is not a claim that I can confirm or refute using google maps.

malandrew• 7 years ago

Deforestation of 20-25% or more is not uncommon at smaller scales and I know of no such example where such an area transformed to savanna.

newsat132• 7 years ago

Unless we as a society return to a simpler lifestyle of living, I see this as an unsolvable problem. For example, everyone in the US is trumpeting climate change and what not. And yet just walk into any starbucks and any supermarket and restaurant - none of that stuff is really recyclable. People generate tons of trash by using home delivery packages via amazon and non-recyclable food containers. Cars everywhere and completely unmaintained public transport. People really aren't willing to make a change but will go on about paris agreement and hate on trump. Their actions and life style say otherwise. What is then wrong with people in other countries wanting a similar life style?

ropiwqefjnpoa• 7 years ago

What no one wants to admit is that our modern way of life is totally unsustainable on any level. Plastic straw bans and the like help us feel like where at least trying, but it's all just band-aids on a gaping wound. Then corporations try and shift the blame to the consumer at the same time making us us dependent on their products as soon as we're born.

fromthestart• 7 years ago

Unless we as a society return to a simpler lifestyle of living, I see this as an unsolvable problem.

There's no reason to presume that it isn't possible to retain our current standard of living while also solving the problem through technological innovation - we've arguably had the solution for decades in the form of nuclear, and we're inching closer every day with developments in non-nuclear renewables and outside of the energy space with innovation in farming (outdoor and indoor/vertical, GMO) and material design.

Despite the doom and gloom, talk along the lines of 12 years before irreversible runaway into catastrophe is really a worst case estimate. Chances are we will have plenty of time to develop technology to slow climate change and adapt to its effects in the coming decades, particularly given that it is a rising concern among citizens the world over.

Honestly, given how much of our infrastructure is dependent on fossil fuels and environmentally unfriendly materials, it simply isn't practical to make the kind of radical transition you're advocating for - our entire food chain, for example relies on modern plastics and ICEs for delivery/storage. The waste you describe from e.g. Starbucks and packaging is probably a small percentage of the waste that our modern civilization is structured upon, even if you convinced everyone to drastically lower their standard of living overnight. Balancing risk with cost, this is a transition that cannot happen overnight anyway.

newsat132• 7 years ago

Agree with you in general.

it simply isn't practical to make the kind of radical transition you're advocating for

The above line is exactly my point. We think changing ourselves is impractical. But we want the rest of the world to abide by our views of "green" and "sustainable living".

sytelus• 7 years ago

If you divide world GDP by number of households in world, the household income turns out to be $59,000. In theory, we have achieved enough progress that everyone on the planet can live fairly rich lives. This is obviously not the case due to massive inequality. But the interesting side effect of this is the age of abundance for few of us. I just drank a bottle of blueberry yogurt and threw away plastic bottle. I get free soda from office and toss aluminium cane to the trace. It just occurs to me how insignificant the existence of that plastic bottle or aluminium cane is for me. It literally existed only for the purpose of providing little liquid and then to disappear forever in that growing pile of trash on the planet. It's amazing to think about how many things in our households we wouldn't consider valuable but would be treasured in some other part of the world. My theory is that this age of abundance is short and possibly in 100 years of time when trash engulfs this planet, mines dries up, raw materials becomes rare material - the future generation would look to us as some sort of envy and anger.

abhisuri97• 7 years ago

Really tangential...but major props to the time mag web dev team for making an unobtrusive reading experience that has graphics and animations that are helpful for driving home key points of the story.

toptal3• 7 years ago

Wait a second, there was just a report put out by NASA that stated the world is become more green, specifically citing the Amazon Rain Forest as an area that’s more green than it was 20 years ago.

Something seems completely wrong here.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2019/02/28/nasa-says...

theferalrobot• 7 years ago

Also a report from NASA that the fires in the Amazon were only slightly higher than normal - less than the levels seen in 2010.

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145498/uptick-in-am...

toptal3• 7 years ago

Right, something seems very off with this journalism here.

9nGQluzmnq3M• 7 years ago

That article doesn't even mention the Amazon? Per the chart, Brazil's net change in leaf area since the 1990s is a fat 0%.

That said, I do wonder if replacing rainforest with soybeans counts as no change in leaf area.

toptal3• 7 years ago

The article doesn’t, however the study does. You can see it’s circled in the map along with China and India. Read the study.

throwaway5752• 7 years ago

Well, you're linking to Forbes, for starters. Even though it's a generally a terrible source of information, the article literally tells you in the headline that "NASA Says Earth Is Greener Today Than 20 Years Ago Thanks To China, India"

It says nothing about the Amazon, which is being cut down and burned down by people. You can see the Amazon as the big tan/light green blob in northern South America in the image in the article. There is just about no net greening. Greening is delta in LAI. You can burn down a rain forest and have a bunch of grass in it's place and there will be no net greening, but on the net it will release a ton of CO2 and destroy the environment.

jtchang• 7 years ago

The US did the same thing with a lot of our natural resources in the past century. it does seem somewhat hypocritical to not let other countries do what we have previously done. What we did was wrong but it also allowed the US to grow to what it is today.

zanny2• 7 years ago

Two wrongs don't make a right. No, it is not owed due to the rising nations of the world to let them continue to devastate the climate in the way first world powers have.

And continue to.

Its easier to point fingers than take responsibility of course. Hence why very little actually gets done to combat climate change. Brazil burns the Amazon, Americans throw out of a ton of plastic a year each, and humanity cooks itself complicit in its own destruction.

wefarrell• 7 years ago

We need an economic framework that makes it more profitable to keep the forest intact than to burn it down and plant soybeans.

It's hypocritical to point the finger at Brazil for exploiting their natural resources when developed countries got rich by doing the same. If we want to prioritize biodiversity and oxygen generation then we should pay the Amazonian countries for it.

amriksohata• 7 years ago

All for meat farming

Why Is the Amazon Rain Forest Disappearing?

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