July 19, 2021
10:07
Marcela Leiros – from Cenarium
MANAUS – The impacts of the devastation of the Amazon Forest go far beyond environmental damage. With the destruction of the forests, natural wealth is lost, but also a lot of money. The constant and growing deforestation in the Brazilian Legal Amazon could generate income losses of US$ 5.6 billion for the soy market and US$ 180.8 billion for meat production in the region until 2050. In Reais, at current values, the amount of economic losses would reach R$ 27 billion and R$ 888 billion, respectively. The figures are the result of a study by researchers from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) who indicate that the destruction of the Amazon generates a chain reaction that affects the entire country and the planet.
The data are contained in the study “Deforestation reduces rainfall and agricultural revenue in the Brazilian Amazon”, published in May this year by researchers from UFMG in the scientific journal Nature Communications. Considering deforestation throughout the Amazon, the financial losses become even greater, since the study only considered deforestation in the south of the region, where devastation is more intense.
The loss of economic values in the region is mainly caused by climate changes that deregulate the rainfall cycle. This cycle is regulated by the rainforest.
In 2020, the annual deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon reached 11 thousand square kilometers, a rate that broke the 2008 record, according to the National Institute for Space Research (Inpe). This year alone, the months of March, April and May reached the three highest deforestation records of the last decade, raising the alarm about the lack of control in the inspection and combat of deforestation in the region.
Although 2050 is still relatively distant, the economic impacts are already felt in a micro perspective. This year, producers in Mato Grosso have already registered losses in the corn crop, the flooding of the rivers in the Amazon has caused impacts and losses in agriculture in the state, and the growing concern with a water crisis in the country, caused by drought, has already mobilized the federal government, which envisions, in the very near future, the need for electricity rationing.
The crises in agriculture and electricity generation, as well as the threat of international markets to stop investing capital in the Brazilian market are caused by a lack of control by the federal government and even due to an “anti-environmental policy”, point out specialists. “The lack of environmental policy, or worse, the anti-environmental policy of the government, contributes to this crisis,” says Greenpeace biologist Rômulo Batista.
This anti-environmental policy is punctuated by the actions of the now former Minister of the Environment, Ricardo Salles – who resigned on June 23 – such as the reduction of investment in agencies like the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (Ibama) and the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio). There are also bills and provisional measures being considered in the House of Representatives and in the Senate, which, if approved, will contribute to the regularization of illegal activities such as land grabbing.
This “ball of problems” falls into the hands of the States of the Brazilian Legal Amazon. They are the ones who bear the losses such as the big fires, generated from deforestation and which cause millionaire losses to the state governments, which need to invest more money and efforts in inspection and monitoring.
The economy is not independent from the forest and, for a long time, researchers and government officials have been indicating that, increasingly, the two aspects should go hand in hand, because only then will it be possible to glimpse a sustainable economic future for the Amazon more clearly on the horizon. This is what CENARIUM MAGAZINE presents in this report.
Traslated by Bruno Sena