Opinion – Marcelo Leite: Ogre band of agribusiness supports anti-Amazon crusade

Travelers to the US states of Washington, Oregon and California this late in the summer don’t worry about the weather forecast — the chance of rain is almost zero. Keep an eye on the fire logs as two dozen wildfires ripple through temperate coniferous forests.

Unlike Brazil and other countries with tropical forests, in this case the direct responsibility of agricultural activity for the flames is negligible. The dryness of the forest and the winds that blow it are aggravated by global warming, of which we are all guilty, starting with the diesel of the huge SUVs of American tourists and the trailers they drag.

Another 500, in Brazil, are fires closely linked to deforestation, particularly in the Amazon. Here, the ogre band of agribusiness is behind the current fire and smoke records that make land use the nation’s biggest source of greenhouse gases.

The more than 33,000 fires registered by the National Institute for Space Research (Inpe) in Brazil in August, most of them in the Amazon, represented an increase of 7% over the same month last year. The calcined area exceeded 24,000 km2, with a growth of 30% over 2021, second only to 2010, a year of unique drought, and 2019, Bolsonaro’s first year.

Fires are not synonymous with recent deforestation, although they are always linked to previous clearings. Fire is also used to clear pastures (which were once forests) and to burn debris accumulated in other seasons. Wildfires like those in the Northwest of the US do not occur in the Amazon, a rainforest.

With the present dynamics of deforestation in the region, however, it is not ruled out that the Amazon forest will move in this direction. Almost 20% of the biome’s coverage has already been cleared, and perhaps as much has been degraded by localized mining and the selective removal of wood and its clandestine roads.

Continued drying from these activities and years of low rainfall with global climate change are predicted to trigger an ecosystem collapse known as a “dieback”. Reaching 25% devastation, the forest would revert to something like a savannah, much more flammable.

How much of this destructive spiral of the rainforest can and should be attributed to agricultural activity? Determining responsibility is not a trivial task, as discussed in an encouraging review article published Friday (9) in the journal Science.

Among the team’s authors is Tasso Azevedo, leader in Brazil of the MapBiomas initiative. The collaborative work casts doubt on a figure often cited in the scientific literature, in addition to international organizations and NGOs: 80% of the deforestation of tropical forests in the world would result from agricultural activity.

The article concludes that a more likely number would be between 90% and 99%. Not every cleared area is immediately converted into fields cultivated with grain, it is true, but agribusiness is not dissociated from speculative deforestation, for example, as the land grabbing with opening of pastures in Brazil clearly demonstrates.

This indirect influence of agribusiness in the devastation of tropical forests certainly complicates the task of combating it. Much effort is devoted, on the international stage, to restricting the trade of commodities linked to deforestation, but the work at Science questions the effectiveness of this exclusive focus, even without denying the importance of such barriers.

Much of the grain, meat and wood from deforestation, after all, is destined for domestic markets, not exports. It’s fire: think about it the next time you go to the supermarket, and in three weeks’ time when you vote.