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Scientists sound alarm bells again on Amazon

Jazz Stofberg,
6 februari 2023 - 15:40

The deforestation of the Amazon is moving faster and more severely than previously thought. That's why UvA geologist Carina Hoorn, with a panel of more than 240 scientists appointed by the UN, is sounding the alarm to protect the Amazon rainforest.

“Time is running out,” says UvA geologist Carina Hoorn on the phone. “If we do not reduce deforestation, by 2050 nearly 40 percent of the original forest could be damaged. I find the idea that almost half of the forest would be destroyed very worrying. People are carrying out an experiment with incalculable global consequences.

Carina Hoorn

Hoorn is part of the Science Panel for the Amazon (SPA), which presented a report on the Amazon's role in the global ecosystem in 2021. This was followed in late January by a literature review in the journal Science about the tremendous rate at which humans are damaging the rainforest.

 

Impoverished ecosystem

The Amazon rainforest covers only half a percent of the Earth’s surface, but contains as many as 10 percent of all plant and vertebrate species. Researchers are once again sounding the alarm because the area is deteriorating even faster than previously thought. Especially in the past four years, there has been much more deforestation, 17 percent more in 2021 and 2022. The southeastern Amazon is in particularly bad shape. Hoorn: “If it continues like this, a threshold will be reached. The rainforest is then expected to turn into an impoverished, unstable ecosystem, more a savanna than a forest.”

 

Much of the increasingly rapid decline is due to policy changes, Hoorn says. “During Bolsonaro’s regime, some environmental protection laws were changed or repealed. This caused people to treat the rainforest differently. Brazil’s policies have a huge impact on the Amazon because most of the rainforest is located there.”

 

Much of the deforestation is for agriculture, such as in the production of soy for animal feed, but also for cattle ranching or the construction of mega-projects such as roads and dams. Reasons for deforestation also vary by region. “Next to the Andes, there is drilling for oil and gas, among other things, while in other parts of the Amazon, gold mining has major adverse effects. Together, this leads to water pollution, dehydration, and higher temperatures.”

“If the destruction is not stopped, the Amazon could become a net source of atmospheric carbon”

From carbon storage to a source of carbon

Many parts of the rainforest are burned, mainly to clear the land. Trees are important for the temperature and water balance of an area, so without trees, it becomes drier and warmer. Deforestation creates a cycle of dehydration and fires: the less forest, the drier it becomes, and the greater the chance of a forest fire, says Hoorn: “On a global scale, the Amazon rainforest is a great store of carbon, but if the destruction is not stopped, it could become a net source of atmospheric carbon. More carbon would then enter the atmosphere through forest burning than the forest stores, with effects on the global ecosystem that would be felt everywhere.”

“Natural recovery is better than planting new trees if you want the original forest back”

The research in Science focuses on the geological and biological history of the Amazon rainforest. “You have to imagine that the rainforest developed over millions of years, a time scale that is difficult for humans to fathom. Over time, the forest cycles through different conditions due to natural processes, so it has not always been the same. It changed from a (tropical) forest in a river landscape to wetlands and probably a more open forest over the past 10 million years. The difference to the present is that past processes occurred naturally. Man-made changes are hundreds to thousands of times faster than natural processes.” The Amazon forest cannot keep up with that pace, putting the ecosystem at risk.

 

One chief recommendation of the SPA is to protect deforested areas to allow them to recover. This can be done through improved wildlife policy and consultation with indigenous people. “That is the right approach to allow the area to recover. If you want the 'original' forest back, planting new trees is not the way. It is better to allow the forest to recover naturally.”

 

On the cover of Science

“The main purpose of the report and this publication is to draw so much attention to this topic that policymakers cannot ignore it,” says Hoorn. “So we are happy to see our research on the cover of a leading journal like Science and thus also on the policymakers’ radar.” Brazil’s new government has already taken some steps in the right direction. “The new environment minister is very committed and himself comes from the Amazon.”