July 29, 2021

13:07

Cassandra Castro – from Cenarium

BRASILIA (DF) – Brazil and the Amazon have a strategic role in the world food production in a scenario of overpopulation. According to a United Nations report, the Earth will have almost 10 billion inhabitants by 2050. If this number is indeed confirmed, almost three planets Earth will be necessary to guarantee the maintenance of the current lifestyle of human beings, according to the World Bank.

The responsibility will fall on the shoulders of the countries located in tropical zones and Brazil stands out in this task for numerous factors, as stated by the agronomist engineer and former Minister of Agriculture, Roberto Rodrigues: “The world trusts the country for three reasons: available land, capable people and sustainable tropical technology that has advanced, mainly, since the 1990s”.

He believes that technology is the greatest ally in the search for a significant increase in agricultural productivity without threatening biomes and forests, as is the case of the Amazon forest. In his opinion, crop-livestock-forest integration is a practice that proves it is possible to produce without cutting down a single tree in the Amazon.

For the agronomist Alysson Paolinelli, the Amazon is vital when the subject is climate and agricultural production due to the phenomenon known as “flying rivers”, huge volumes of water vapor coming from the Atlantic Ocean and gaining strength in the Amazon and from there they follow to several Brazilian states, especially those located in the center-south.

“We have to be very cautious about the Amazon because it is also a great biological repository and in the middle of the so-called bio-economy era I am sure that science will look for a way to obtain in the Amazon the greatest biotechnological solutions to the challenge of food production,” he said.

Paolinelli also highlights the fact that Brazil created, 40 years ago, a highly sustainable tropical agriculture. This, in his view, ensures that Brazilian production can grow without the need to incorporate even one hectare, which means, in practice, less deforestation.

“Deforestation is not advantageous for Brazil, directly agriculture does not depend on it, however, the failures of the Amazon, of the whole process of evapotranspiration that forms the flying rivers can harm the production in the country. We have to restrain deforestation and our hope is that science will show that a tree is better off standing than fallen”, he concluded.