Deforestation in the Amazon and the Risk of Climate Change

Map of the Rainforest

Introduction

The Amazon Rainforest is one of the major natural wonders of the world, its land size of 2.1 million squared miles speaks for itself alone. Theres is thousands of years of history in this beloved forest and needs to be preserved for as long as possible. The Amazon Rain Forest is really interesting because it stands as the largest rainforest in the world, but was also given the nickname "The Lungs of the Planet" and that is because it takes in so much carbon dioxide and releases it back as oxygen. Deforestation in the Amazon would effect people in the local area (tribes within the forest), the nearby area (main cities in South America) and ultimately the whole human race when it comes to climate change.

For my research I wanted to focus on deforestation in the Amazon, why it was happening, who was benefiting, who was at risk, what were the potential risks, how it effects climate change and if there were any sustainable ways to deforest.

Deforestation in the Amazon

Major Themes

  • Deforestation is mostly due to lack of space for farmland, commercial industries, and overpopulation in general.
  • The government sees deforestation as a benefit to the economy because it can create more jobs and infrastructure.
  • Deforestation can lead to many other risks such as drought, flooding, erosion and forest fires.
  • Deforestation has a major impact on climate and global warming.
  • Money and resources is more important than protecting native eco-system's.

Research Questions

  • How does climate change and deforestation relate to each other?
  • What are potential risks of deforestation in the Amazon?
  • What is the reason for deforestation on the Amazon?

JUSTIFICATION

I think this topic relates to the class because it is all about the risk and vulnerability within the situation. The vulnerability is for the people in the amazon and around the amazon with the other after risks to still be possible. The main risk with deforestation is the problem that rises with climate change, deforestation has been going on in the Amazon for 13 years now and we have seen a rise is climate and CO2 in Brazil but yet we still continue it. Deforestation relates to this class because of the risks it brings in the current time but also the future, if you look at the Access model it talks about the hazard event being followed by another disaster whether its climate, resources, or geological. Deforestation is main the problem right now in the Amazon but it wont be the last. There will be further implications in the Amazon that will eventually be more hazardous than deforestation but it will be too late to stop it. In this situation climate change can be considered the hazard while deforestation is the dynamic pressures.

Citations:

Rabelo, Rafael M, et al. “Predicted Distribution and Habitat Loss for the Endangered Black-Faced Black Spider Monkey Ateles Chamek in the Amazon.” Oryx, 2018, pp. 1–7.

This article discusses the loss of habitat and wildlife in the Amazon due to deforestation. It brings up the point of deforestation in the Amazon increasing at a rapid rate, they are saying due to agricultural advances we could see most of the Amazon wiped out by 2050. The key specie they are looking into is the endangered black face black spider monkey. The article researches the amount of the forest that is already gone and then compares it to the amount of spider monkeys that were lost in that time and have been able to conclude using this model that 31-40% of its habitat would be lost by 2050 practically making it extinct. The articles questions how the spider monkey can be on the endangered list but still receive a very low amount of government safety for their environment. The article ends saying how we need to protect the Amazon as a whole but specifically at least the main 3 patches of where they are located need to be protected. Those 3 areas are the southern, eastern and western sides of the forests.

This article was really helpful because it gave me strong proof of the effects on habitat loss when it comes to deforestation in the Amazon. I also think it opened my eyes to the protection of the forest and whos really allowed to cut down the trees. It makes me think that the forest is mostly public land, but also not represented land so no one can really have a say on most of the areas they are cutting down. If people were able to buy the land space they would be able to save that area, and there has been reports of that happening. The article used a program to try and figure out what the future could be like for the forest and the black faced spider monkey, similar to what the PAR model does. It relates to the topic as well by looking into the other risks that get brought up with deforestation.


Araujo, Claudio, et al. “Determinants of Amazon Deforestation: the Role of off-Farm Income.” Environment and Development Economics, vol. 24, no. 2, 2019, pp. 138–156.

Amazon River

This article by Claudio Araujo goes into detail about the determinants of the Amazon deforestation. The article compares large manufacturer farming to a low scale farming known as "off farming". The article does a nice job looking into the Brazilians government type of tax and subsidies they offered for farmers. They found out that most off farming in Brazil has been one of the major causes to deforestation in the Amazon. The financial system in Brazil right now is very bad and small farmers are trying to find ways to survive and keep they're farm, the Brazilian governments idea was to offer money for part of the land and cut down all the trees to one, create more jobs and two, bring more income to the farmer because he will have more space to farm. The article wraps it up by saying if small farmers were able to compete and make a good living we would see a reduction in deforestation.

This article was helpful for my Body 2 section where I can talk about the "benefits" of deforestation and this article brings up a lot of interesting points for that. I feel like this article ties into the project pretty well because they talk about the Brazilian government having a big part in deforestation, which makes me want to research what they're people/government think about the issue or even if they think its an issue. I think it relates to the class because it brings in the vulnerability of the course in the sense that tons of small farmers are unable to make enough to survive on a daily basis and have to resort in unethical ways to live.


Gomes, Vitor H.F, et al. “Amazonian Tree Species Threatened by Deforestation and Climate Change.” Nature Climate Change, vol. 9, no. 7, 2019, pp. 547–553.

This article by Vitor Gomes explains how they are running tests on native Amazonian trees and studying how they have been doing with the rise of climate and also the studies on future climates, pretty much if we don't change anything will they still be able to survive. That answer is no, their model has shown that deforestation and climate change could decrease the amount of native tress by 58% by the year 2050. The article discusses the dangers of deforestation on these trees and the climate cycles that are quickly changing. They do bring up one solution, it is to divide the Amazon into two distinct blocks and keep the one area with native trees protected to diminish the effects of climate change and forest biodiversity.

This article was interesting because the test they have used a model that looked into real data in the past around the rise in climate change and related tried to replicate it for the future. Obviously the test is only that, a test. There is no hard evidence other than the fact that climate change will only get worse unless we do something about it. This article mentions a lot about deforestation which I think could help my topic, one of the facts they have is that in the year 2013 deforestation resulted in a 7% decline of native trees. This article relates to two of sections, the climate change section and the who's at risk section. I think the article relates to the class because it brings up the risk that is involved with these native trees going endangered.

Native Amazonian Trees

Nunes Kehl, Thiago, et al. “Amazon Rainforest Deforestation Daily Detection Tool Using Artificial Neural Networks and Satellite Images.” Sustainability (Basel, Switzerland), vol. 4, no. 10, 2012, pp. 2566–2573.

Terra Satellite

In Thiago Nunes Kehl's book, he goes into detail on a satellite mapping program the University of Vale do Rio do Sinos to capture the deforestation on the Amazon at real time. Since the Brazilian government made it legal for some of the Amazon to be chopped down and doesnt have a very good way to track the amount of the deforestation the university took it upon itself to create a satellite neural activity map. The program uses the MODIS/TERRA satellite that NASA built to get accurate archeological representations of the Amazon. This program is one, trying to save the Amazon from deforestation but also helps find where the illegal deforesting is taking place. The first time they implemented the program and used was back in 2003, it captured 57 images of the landscape and overall shape of the Amazon which gave the university its first updated map of the deforested Amazon.

This article was an important find because it was my first discovery on a group that actually a system implemented to focus on the amount of deforesting and where they are deforesting. I liked this article because it talks about illegal deforestation and the certain areas that were deemed "okay" to chop down, the Brazilian government had promised that it would look after the process of cutting back some of the Amazon but only kept that up for the first year. Since then we have seen a lot of illegal and dangerous activity in certain protected areas of the Amazon. The program that the university made opened many other paths for the future of the neural network of the rainforest.


COOK, Kerry H, and VIZY, Edward K. “Effects of Twenty-First-Century Climate Change on the Amazon Rain Forest.” Journal of Climate, vol. 21, no. 3, 2008, pp. 542–560.

Amazon Rain

This article by Kerry Cook and Edward Vizy discuss the current and potential impacts of climate change with the reduction of the rainforest. The rainfall in the Amazon is very hard to track because one, the massive land size and two, there is so much of it. Due to those circumstances the WWF (World Wildlife Federation) estimates the annual rainfall in the Amazon is anywhere from 1500mm to 3000mm, the closer you get to the equator the more rainfall you see. The Canadian Climate Center made a GCM to do a simulation of the Amazon in the coming decades. According to the model and the rate we tend to be going we could see that rainfall in the Amazon decrease as much as 70% by the year 2081, causing a drastic change in environmental seasons and other severe tropical storms.

I thought this article was very interesting because of the model it used to get its data. It used previous information of the change in climate in the Amazon from back in the 1980s to where we are now and replicated that same type of progression for their simulation. I thought that was a good way to simulate this natural disaster because it uses proof we have seen to back it up so yes, it is a simulation but it uses the best knowledge and information we have to test their theory. GCM stands for Global Circulation Model, the model is used to focus on the future climate circulations we could see. The GCM gives a regional overview to deal with the potential impacts.


Vijay, Varsha, et al. “Deforestation Risks Posed by Oil Palm Expansion in the Peruvian Amazon.” Environmental Research Letters, vol. 13, no. 11, 2018, p. 114010.

In the Amazon Rainforest we have a lot of different wildlife that have to live together, this creates a very competitive environment for both wildlife animals and plants. In this article by Varsha Vijay, he discusses the presence of African Oil Palm trees (Elaeis guineensis) and how they effect the ecosystem around them. In the recent years oil palm creation and consumption has doubled, and looks to get only bigger. So now we have a demand of a product that comes from a tree, theres no friendly way to extract the oil so the only way to get it is killing the tree or chopping it down, the start of deforestation. These trees that contain the oil do a lot more for the ecosystem than we could even imagine. They provide habitat for thousands of birds in the Amazon and also benefit quite a few mammals in the area.

This article was very interesting and a good find for me in my research because I got to see a real life process of needing a product, starting to consume the product and then the after affects of doing so. It showed me that every disaster has another negative aspect to follow. The article opened my eyes to the way an ecosystem works with its surrounding species, the relationship between the birds and the palm oil trees is very important for the birds and the tree. If all African Oil Palm trees get cut down it will lead to the birds looking for a new place to put their nest and that would start natural selection for those birds since they will be going into undiscovered territory.


Mammadova, Aynur, et al. “Making Deforestation Risk Visible. Discourses on Bovine Leather Supply Chain in Brazil.” Geoforum, vol. 112, 2020, pp. 85–95.

This article by Aynur Mammadova discusses the major supply chains of Brazil but specifically bovine leather. The article starts by telling us the "big four" products in Brazil and those are soy beans, palm oil, beef and timber. The Brazilian government has been pushing for transparency and traceability with these projects. These supply chains are labeled as the "sustainable supply chains" however the data behind it is nowhere to be found and the chains are managed very closely so the whole transparency aspect is flawed. The bovine leather supply chain is the same way, there is no close regulations nor health and safety checks for this farms. The Brazilian government says its too "difficult" to track all the small suppliers. The role the cattle play for deforestation is land size, the more space, the more leather, the more money for the farmers.

What I learned in this article was unique in the sense that it talks about the major supply chains in Brazil and the supposable regulation the government carries out. The bovine leather industry is very different since it it mostly behind closed doors and done in a very dirty way even though it is supposed to be sustainable and transparent. This article also gave me more insight to reasoning for deforestation in the Amazon. I have been able to learn about the need for resources in Brazil, and parts of the countries economic climate right now.


Guimberteau, Matthieu, et al. “Impacts of Future Deforestation and Climate Change on the Hydrology of the Amazon Basin : A Multi-Model Analysis with a New Set of Land-Cover Change Scenarios.” Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, vol. 21, no. 3, 2017, pp. 1455–1475.

In Matthieu's article about the future of the Amazon, he talks about the change we could see with the hydrology of the area. Through their model they have seen a decrease in evapotranspiration, the model uses the regional weather pattern and land coverage to predict the future of the rainforest. Their model predicts an increase of 3.3 degrees Fahrenheit with no deforestation, with deforestation it could be way more, not including the other possible risks like run off, new storm patterns, precipitation levels rising. One thing the article emphasizes is the impact deforestation will have on all of the Amazon and how one of the impacts would be the Rainforest having two different types of climates. The article says with the increase of deforestation some parts of the Amazon would be receiving tons of rain while the south eastern part of the Amazon would be the driest it has ever been.

This article has significant impact on my research and story map through the date represented in the report. It is just a model so we have to take it with a grain of salt but they do use historical data to back up their work. I thought this article made some interesting points, especially with the possible two different weather patterns in a relatively small area. I learned that deforestation could have impacts on all other water areas in South America, specifically the Rio Tapajos river could be unusually low in the next decade.


Shukla, J, et al. “Amazon Deforestation and Climate Change.” Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science), vol. 247, no. 4948, 1990, pp. 1322–1325.

Dr. Shukla did a research article about deforestation in the Amazon back in the 1990s and linked deforestation to have a strong impact on climate change in the future. He worked with colleagues form the American Association for the Advancement of Science, to create a test that studied the distribution of vegetation in the Amazon. Back in the 1990s they discovered that a lot of the vegetation in the Amazon was not suited to be living in tropical temperatures, and the global temperature only rising they knew it was going in the wrong direction. Their study showed that most vegetation in the area would be gone by the year 2100 if every thing continued at the same rate. They end the article explaining that the rapid destruction of the environment could have an impact that would completely wipe out the eco-system forever.

This article was published back in the 1990s and that is what jumped out to me about it. We usually see articles involving climate change be from the 21st century and usually more recent, but to have this article published 21 years ago and discuss a lot of the important facts we see now was insane to me. The entire world has known about the impact that deforesting the Amazon could have on the world all the way from the 90s and we have only gotten worse. My biggest take away from this article was the call for help the article had with it, trying to prove to civilians that this was a real issue and needed to be looked at, and the risk we take with future precipitation in the area.


Tollefson, Jeff. “Battle for the Amazon.” Nature (London), vol. 520, no. 7545, 2015, pp. 20–23.

In the article Battle for the Amazon by Jeff Tollefson we get a detailed look into a Brazilian cattle farmer named Oziel Alves da Silva. Oziel, is 39 years old at the time of the article and he talks about the hope and dreams he had for his farm, he dreamed of having a massive farm in the outer part of the Amazon. Oziel, like other farmers wanted more land, until he was hit with a $230,000 fine and banned from selling cattle after trying to cut down the trees in his area. The Brazilian government ended up sending soldiers to the farm to make sure no illegal trimming was happening. The Brazilian government estimates that 20% of the Amazon Rainforest has been illegally cut down by local farmers.

I really enjoyed this article because it was my first reference that contained a perspective from someone who wasn't a scientist nor government official, it was from a farmer. I got to learn how the Brazilian governments works and prevents the farmers from doing certain activities. I was very surprised about the major fine the farmer received since he was only attempting too. While reading the article something interesting came to my brain, and I was wondering why the government thinks its okay and allows themselves to do their own deforesting but small farmers on their paid for land cant do what they want with it. It is very strange and unethical, the government obviously goes against their word on trying to preserve the rainforest.


Wisner, Benjamin, et. al. At Risk: Natural Hazards, Peoples Vulnerability and Disasters. London: Routledge, 2008.

At Risk is about how risk and vulnerability relate and build up together. It goes over several models of predicting a risk and the vulnerability of the area. The models range from looking at the risk from for the people and how it can contribute to their vulnerability, while another model looks into the hazard of the disaster and its future after effects.

At Risk provided me with an overall understanding out two models specifically, the PAR Model and the Access Model. In contributed to my articles about deforestation and it's further risks and hazards. The At Risk book is the backbone of this project and I can thank Dr Hommel and Dr Wisner for that.

PRACTICAL APPLICATION

The Amazon Rainforest is a complex eco-system and topic to break down when it comes to the truth and ethical part of the deforestation. I have learned that the Brazilian government tends to be not be bothered by the fact all this deforestation could lead to a massive spike in global warming and I think that is because of greed, the country can create a lot more jobs and make more money in this difficult time. However, this has been getting plenty of attention of many countries in South America and especially the Brazilian people to speak out on this which is just the start. There is still the other side of the people who are the farmers that want more land. Another thing I learned was all of the possible future impacts deforestation can have on an environment, and how those impacts could be even worse than what we are dealing with now. With deforestation comes habitat loss for native plants and animals, wild varieties of coastal storms, strange weather patterns for multiple parts of the Amazon and more issues for Brazil.

As of now with what we have already done in the Amazon it is considered a disaster because it has gone too far and has had permanent affects on the whole world. For connecting it to the class I think the best reasoning would be the PAR model we see in the class textbook At Risk by Blaiki Wisner. The PAR model starts with the root causes, for this topic that root cause would be the Brazilian governments need for resources and economic structure. The next step is the dynamic pressures, I think in this scenario the dynamic pressure would be overpopulation and climate change. Next we have the unsafe conditions, and for that I would say living near the Amazon would be an unsafe condition or the lack of worry the government has on the issue. Then BOOM! We have the actual disaster, and in this case that disaster is the deforestation itself, even though humans are the ones who technically started it, we have pushed it too far to turn it around and that has causes some natural deforestation to occur through the waste we leave behind and overall damage to the forest. The last thing the PAR model discusses is the hazard, the hazard in this case would be a lot of things possible risks, could be drought, forest fires, flooding or the big one, climate change.

The practical application I would like to implement is a policy that plants two trees for every one tree chopped down. This would require someone to regulate the deforestation projects, to get precise numbers about the number of trees chopped. It is apparent from the Brazilian government that preserving the rainforest is something very important to them, so i think they would be open to the idea of someone to monitor the whole process. The planting of trees could be anywhere in Brazil or really anywhere in South America to try and fight against the loss of trees. I think this would be realistically the only way to combat the situation because the nation needs the space but cant be cutting down that much of our carbon sinks (trees).

Amazon River

Native Amazonian Trees

Terra Satellite

Amazon Rain