***********************************************
WORLDWIDE
FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS
Brazil's
Forests Burning
***********************************************
9/30/96
OVERVIEW
& SOURCE by EE
Following
are two reports of increased burning in the Brazilian rain
forests
from the Cable News Network and Reuters.
Despite a number of
recent
Brazilian government actions meant to curb such rainforest
destruction,
lack of enforcing mechanisms are labeled the reason why the
traditional
burning season continues.
g.b.
*******************************
RELAYED
TEXT STARTS HERE:
ITEM #1
Greenpeace
says Brazil Amazon fires defy new laws
9/26/96
Copyright
1996 by Reuters
BRASILIA
(Reuter) - The burning of Brazil's Amazon region continues
unchecked
despite recent government moves to slow rain forest destruction,
Greenpeace
said Thursday.
Observers
for the environmental group witnessed large areas of remote
forest
burning in a region located between the town of Maraba and the
timber
center of Paragominas, both in Para state, Roberto Kishinami,
Greenpeace's
executive director in Brazil, said.
"From
what we saw, the measures have had no affect," Kishinami told Reuters
by
telephone. "The destruction is massive, and it is being provoked
deliberately."
During a 90-minute flight over the region, five Greenpeace
workers
detected and filmed about 20 areas of burning forest, he said.
Farmers
in the Amazon region traditionally burn their properties at this
time of
year to clear land for pasture before the region's rainy season,
due to
begin in October.
In July
a new Brazilian law banned landowners from clearing more than 20
percent
of virgin forest on their land and suspended for two years new
licenses
for the logging of mahogany and virola trees.
The
measures came after official data showed 5,750 square miles of Brazil's
Amazon
forest were cleared in 1994, up from 4,298 square miles in 1991.
Eduardo
Martins, president of the government's Brazilian Environment
Institute
(Ibama), acknowledged that illegal burning was continuing but
said
hopes that the government could stop destruction immediately were
unrealistic.
"Without
a doubt, a lot of the burnings (Greenpeace) is detecting are in
violation
of the decrees, but even if we had an effective monitoring
system,
it would be very difficult to get to them before they happen,"
Martins
said.
Ibama
is currently concentrating on preventing illegal logging, which it
considers
to be the principal threat to the Amazon basin, and will only
begin
detecting forest burning next year when new satellite data is due for
release.
Kishimani
of Greenpeace said urgent action was needed and called on the
government
to stop immediately all loans from state banks to cattle farmers
in the
Amazon region. He said new rules that prioritize loans for owners of
cleared
land was, in fact, encouraging farmers to cut down more jungle.
"If
Brazil continues financing the sector, it will be giving a signal to
the
farmers that they can keep on destroying the forests," he said.
ITEM #2
Burning
Brazil's rain forests
Action
taken to curb escalating deforestation
September
26, 1996
Web
posted at: 4:15 p.m. EDT (2015 GMT)
From
Correspondent Marina Mirabella
c 1996
Cable News Network, Inc.
SAO
JOSE DOS CAMPOS, Brazil (CNN) -- Despite action by the Brazilian
government
to protect the Amazon rain forest, environmentalists are
concerned
that a trend of rising deforestation will continue.
The
latest alarm comes during the burning season, a time when Brazilian
ranchers
and farmers clear large tracks of land in the world's largest rain
forest
-- land that is home to tens of thousands of species of plants and
animals.
Figures
compiled by satellite surveillance show 5,700 square miles (15,000
square
kilometers) of rain forest were cleared in 1994, an increase of
34
percent over a three-year period, according to Brazil's National
Institute
for Space Research.
'This
worries us'
Figures
for 1995 have yet to be released, but Ruy de Goes of the
environmental
organization Greenpeace fears the trend will continue. "The
burning
of the Amazon is not over. We thought things were improving in the
late
1980s when destruction was down, but now it's on the increase again
and
this worries us," he told CNN.
The
Brazilian government reacted to the newly released data by introducing
a series
of measures aimed at slowing the rate of deforestation:
*
Requiring Amazon landowners to preserve 80 percent of their land.
*
Enacting a two-year ban on making new government concessions regarding
the
logging of mahogany and other rare trees.
"These
measures are a good first step," said de Goes, "but the problem
is
enforcing
them."
Environmentalists
say the government doesn't have enough inspectors or
resources
in the vast Amazon region to effectively control deforestation.
But
rain forest researcher Thelma Krug is more optimistic. Referring to
next
year's satellite survey she says: "We are looking forward to
positive
results."
###RELAYED
TEXT ENDS###
This
document is a PHOTOCOPY and all recipients should seek permission from
the
source for reprinting. You are
encouraged to utilize this information
for
personal campaign use. All efforts are
made to provide accurate,
timely
pieces; though ultimate responsibility for verifying all information
rests
with the reader. Check out our Gaia
Forest Conservation Archives at
URL= http://forests.org/
Networked
by:
Ecological
Enterprises
Email
(best way to contact)-> gbarry@forests.org