<
https://news.mongabay.com/2024/12/the-amazon-in-2025-challenges-and-hopes-as-the-rainforest-takes-center-stage/>
"In just under a year from now, the world will turn to Belém, Brazil, a city on
the edge of the Amazon Rainforest, for the COP30 United Nations climate summit.
For many conservationists and diplomats, the hope is that the setting will
inspire authorities to finally lead breakthroughs in the Paris Agreement and
keep climate change under some degree of control. While hosting the summit in
an Amazonian city carries significant political and symbolic weight, the
location also underscores contradictions.
As the global spotlight shines on Belém, visitors and the world will be exposed
to the Amazon’s stark contradictions. They will witness the region’s
breathtaking beauty and crucial role in mitigating climate change. However, the
city chosen to champion environmental action is grappling with unsustainable
development projects to host the event.
This collision of ambition and reality will underscore the ongoing struggle
between conservation efforts and the relentless pressures of economic
development, land grabbing, and illegal activities that threaten the
rainforest’s delicate ecosystem.
For the past two years, the Amazon experienced consecutive extreme droughts,
with 2024 being exceptionally severe, leaving major rivers at record lows.
These phenomena reflect a combination of factors, including deforestation,
climate change, and natural variability. The droughts have had cascading
effects on local communities, disrupting transportation, fishing, and access to
clean water.
Adding to the crisis, fire outbreaks, many suspected to be criminal, have
consumed an area of the rainforest larger than Costa Rica. The fires, fueled by
dry conditions and human activity, released vast amounts of carbon dioxide into
the atmosphere, exacerbating climate change, while the smoke they generated
blanketed vast regions, impacting air quality and human health.
Will the Amazon’s climate return to normal in 2025 after two years of drought?
Will the rains return, replenishing rivers and restoring ecosystems? Or has a
drier climate become the new reality for the rainforest? Experts warn that the
Amazon may be approaching its point of no return, as deforestation and forest
degradation have already affected around 13% of the biome, according to the
Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP), a U.S.-based nonprofit. The
forests are drying out, making them more vulnerable to fires, with potentially
irreversible damage looming. A report from World Weather Attribution (WWA)
estimates that climate change increased the likelihood of Amazon droughts by a
factor of 30.
Paradoxically, while the drought and fires rage, deforestation in the Brazilian
Amazon, home to about two-thirds of the rainforest, has plunged recently.
Deforestation rates in the country dropped by 30.6% over the past year, hitting
the lowest level since 2015. This decline is attributed, in part, to heavier
enforcement of environmental regulations. As a result, deforestation linked to
garimpos, small-scale gold miners (often illegal), in the Amazon plummeted by
30% in 2023 compared to 2022."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
