Still lots of Amazon rain forest is left to destroy
Copyright 2001 Toronto Star
October 27, 2001
By Axel Bugge, REUTERS NEWS AGENCY
ENVIRONMENTALISTS fume when reminded that 4,000 square kilometres of the Amazon, almost the size of Prince Edward Island, is destroyed every year. But they can cheer the fact that 86 per cent of the forest still stands.
For many, the Amazon is the stuff of myths - the world's largest tropical forest stretching for thousands of kilometres, impenetrable and inhabited only by Indians and killer jaguars. Yet for the thousands fighting to save the home of up to half the world's animal and plant life, facts and figures are the key as the 10-year anniversary of the landmark global 1992 Rio Earth Summit hosted by Brazil approaches.
Next week, Brazil will host a meeting of Latin American environment ministers intended to co-ordinate regional positions ahead of what has been dubbed here as "Rio+10" - a summit in South Africa next year to follow up on the global environmental agenda agreed to in 1992.
Environmentalists say the meeting will focus on efforts since 1992 to save what is seen by many as the "lungs of the planet" because of the vast amount of oxygen produced in the Amazon. Many experts fear dire consequences if deforestation endures.
An area larger than western Europe, 85 per cent of the Amazon is in Brazil.
"Land-use change is causing an unprecedented imbalance in Amazonia," said Carlos Nobre, general co-ordinator of temperature and climate studies at Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE), in a recent report.
He warned that the logging, fires and farming in the Amazon could create "biodiversity losses of unknown magnitude."
Such fears of the Amazon's destruction extend to possible regional temperature rises, less rainfall and accelerated rates of desertification, where land becomes parched and useless.
Some environmentalists have pushed for an Amazon sanctuary to ensure its survival - something Brazilian authorities rule out, not least because the region's population has grown to 20 million from 3.5 million in 1970.
The most concrete success pointed to by the government is that the rate of the Amazon's destruction fell in the 1990s to average yearly levels of around 1.8 million hectares from more than 2.5 million hectares in the 1980s.
A recent study found that a $60 billion government development plan could destroy or damage up to 42 per cent of the Amazon if it goes ahead.