[WILD ROAR] RAIN FOREST ALERT
Karl Dietz
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WILD ROAR, issue 19.01.2000
THATS WHAT EVERYBODY NEEDS TO KNOW AND ACT UPON IT!
Thanks go to the author, Stephan Schwartzman, the Environmental
Defence Fund, the Native Americas Journal as well as to forests.org
and Glen Barry.
WILDNET
ECOTERRA - Freedom for People and Nature
FIRST PEOPLES & NATURE FIRST!
Reigniting the Rainforest
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1/13/00
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY
Following is an excellent overview of the rainforest conservationissue.
It highlights the fact that while rainforest conservation mayhave lost its
place as environmental cause of the day, the problem isno less threatening
to the Planet's functioning. The linkage betweenclimate change and
deforestation is discussed. "Forests could be thedeterminant between low-
end temperature increase, slow enough to adaptto without major social
disruptions, and high-end change, faster thancurrent social arrangements
will easily bear." Take the time to readthis illuminating article, chock
full of facts, and pass it on toothers that may use it for rainforest
conservation education.
g.b.
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Reigniting the Rainforest
Fires, Development and Deforestation
Source: Native Americas Journal,
http://nativeamericas.aip.cornell.edu/
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprintDate:
Fall 1999
Byline: Stephan Schwartzman, Environmental Defense Fund
The rainforest used to be a most fashionable environmental cause in
Hollywood, but movie stars, along with much of America, have
limitedattention spans, and lately, the rainforest has fallen from favor.
The destruction of the rainforest is as real a dilemma as it was tenyears
ago, only fewer people discuss it.
The rainforest has real implications and consequences for all of us.Forest
destruction, particularly in the tropics, and the still-openquestion of
whether or not it can be slowed or stopped, very likelywill be more
important to the ecological condition of the planet ourchildren and
grandchildren will inherit than anything else happeningin the world today.
The destruction is worse than you think, and islikely to affect you and
your children. But the chances to stop it arealso much better, in large
part because of what people in the forest-
indigenous peoples-and their allies in the environmental movement
aredoing.
IS IT JUST A CASE OF TOO MANY PEOPLE?
An area of forest bigger than Belgium, Holland and Austria puttogether, or
about 40 percent of California, was cut down and burnedevery year between
1980 and 1995, some 62,000 square miles per year.NASA's Landsat satellite
photographs show that more than 200,000square miles, an area about the
size of France, has been cleared andburned in Brazil alone. All of this
has happened since the 1970s.
Clearly, old-growth forest, or forest that has remained virtuallyuntouched
by industrial development, has a very different value in aworld of 6
billion people. It does not look inexhaustible anymore. Butglobal
aggregates alone cannot be blamed for the devastation of old-
growth forests.
A very large part of forest destruction is driven by
multinationalcorporate developments many times at the expense of poor
people (suchas Indians and other minorities).
Across the tropics, energy and infrastructure development (pipelines,oil
and gas extraction, roads and dams) and mining have taken a heavytoll.
Guyanese Amerindians, the Ogoni minority of Nigeria and NewGuinea tribal
peoples all can testify that multinational investment inthe tropics often
has featured the dismal combination of environmentaldamage, compromised
health for local people and human rights abuses.Major players in the
global development race have used public moneyand (with the partial
exception of U.S. export credit agencies) havedone so with minimal or no
environmental, freedom-of-information orhuman rights policies.
American consumers are linked directly to tropical deforestation
bytropical timber exports. Each piece of mahogany furniture and everystrip
of Indonesian plywood are a part of the devastation. Bothcommodities are
key causes of opening up the most pristine rainforestsin the world to
depredation, fires and invasion of indigenous people'slands. Tropical
timber is a small item in U.S. wood and wood productconsumption, but it
has environmental and human consequencesdrastically out of proportion to
its economic value.
It is, however, important to understand that most tropical timber
isconsumed in tropical countries-Brazil exports only 14 percent of
thetimber extracted from the Amazon. U.S. consumption of tropical
timbercould cease altogether with little or no appreciable effect
ondeforestation in most of the tropics, unless consumption patterns inAsia
and the developing countries also change.
Americans use 10 times more paper products than developing countries,but
the consumption of wood and paper is growing much faster in thedeveloping
world than in the United States.
Some scientists estimate that there are only 5.2 million square milesof
old-growth forest (not just tropical, but temperate and boreal aswell)
left in the world. That 62,000 square-mile-a-year deforestationfigure
could be off by 10,000 either way, but if it does not radicallyslow down-
and soon-no old-growth will be left in just two humanlifetimes.
Eradicating the old-growth forests of the world would change thecourse of
evolution on the planet in ways that we cannot imagine. Itcould also make
global warming happen much faster than it already is,and in ways that
could seriously impair the planet's ability tosustain life at the levels
it presently does. Ecosystems, as Nativepeople and, more recently,
ecologists have long warned, areinterconnected like a Chinese puzzle-take
one piece out, and it allstarts to come apart.
FIRE AND RAIN
Forests do things for us we continue to ignore and discount, to
ourincreasing loss. These things are sometimes called "ecosystemservices"
and they are in ever-shorter supply. China, not a worldleader in green
consciousness, last year banned all logging in its fewremaining natural
forests after disastrous flooding wreaked havocalong heavily populated
rivers. In so doing, China hoped to saveremnants of forest cover on the
upper headwaters. But so much forestis already gone that it may not make
much difference.
In February, numerous people died and hundreds of millions of dollarsin
property was destroyed in massive floods that shut down theindustrial
capital of South America, Sao Paolo. Paving over everypatch of green that
could have absorbed run-off is one major reason.Some 70 percent of
Brazil's population lives in the coastal Atlanticforest region. Their
water supply, flood control, soil conservationand regional climate all
ultimately depend on this forest, which ismore than 90 percent gone.
Experts now expect a third of the world'spopulation to face serious water
shortages in the next 25 years-themost and worst where there are the least
old-growth forests.
The Amazon is a good example of how trees and water connect-about halfof
the rain that falls on the forest is produced by the forest itself,which
breathes out water through its multi-billions of capillaries.Cut the
forest down and there are fewer plants to hold the rain andcycle it back.
More water runs off, carrying more topsoil, leavingless to make rain. The
Amazon has about a fifth of the fresh water inthe world, so it is not
drying up-yet.
FRUITS OF THE FOREST
Tropical forests hold between 50 and 90 percent of the living specieson
the planet. This margin of uncertainty accounts for what biologistsdo not
know about the plants and animals in tropical forests. No morethan one-
tenth of the species alive are known to science (and maybeonly one-one
hundredth).
Tropical forests have given us rubber, chocolate, vanilla, quinine,
d-tubocurarine (which, made from the arrow poison curare,revolutionized
modern surgery) and vincristine (extracted fromMadagascar periwinkle,
which greatly increased survival rates forchildhood leukemia). Scientists
have recently reported a newgeneration of painkillers under development,
much more powerful thanheroin, but non-addictive-based on frog venom
traditionally used byAmazon Natives for shamanic purposes.
Diminished forests will mean diminished biotic resources. Biologistshave
calculated that the greatest wave of extinction since thedinosaurs
disappeared 60 million years ago is happening now because oftropical
forest loss.
WHERE THERE IS SMOKE . . .
The grand master of ecological disasters is global warming. It
coverseverything. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,
some2,000 climate scientists strong, has concluded that the Earth
isalready warmer than it was a century ago, and could become between
onedegree and 3.5 degrees Celsius warmer on average over the nextcentury,
largely because of the carbon dioxide and other gases we arepouring into
the atmosphere. How quickly and how much warming occurscould make a big
difference. Scientists are already documenting risingsea levels and
melting glaciers, and looking at shifting ecologicalzones, more rapid
evaporation and more extreme weather patterns.
Scientists point to carbon dioxide as the primary suspect in thisunfolding
story of ecological cataclysm. Specifically, carbon dioxidefrom fossil
fuels in industrialized countries-with the United Statesfirst and
foremost. But the burning of tropical forests runs a strongsecond-tropical
forest destruction has contributed some 20 percent ofthe carbon dioxide
buildup in the atmosphere. The burning of theBrazilian Amazon as measured
in the Landsat pictures alone contributesabout 5 percent of annual global
carbon dioxide emissions.
Furthermore, recent research suggests that forests may act as
carbon"sinks"-which take up and store more carbon than they give off
inphotosynthesis, and absorb even more in an increasingly carbon-
richatmosphere. Forests could be the determinant between low-
endtemperature increase, slow enough to adapt to without major
socialdisruptions, and high-end change, faster than current
socialarrangements will easily bear.
The recent wildfires in Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico and the UnitedStates
have triggered an alarm. More fires mean even more carbondioxide in the
atmosphere. But the truly hair-raising prospect is thatclimate change may
be making the forests drier and more fire-prone,while more fires hasten
the change, making bigger fires more likely.The Woods Hole Research Center
has found that for every acre clearedand burned in the Amazon, at least
another acre burns in ground firesunder the forest canopy and/or is
degraded by selective logging (notpicked up by the satellites). The
frequency and extent of these groundfires skyrocket in El Nixo events,
which can then cause drought insome tropical forests-and such fires are
likely to increase infrequency and intensity with global warming.
The fire that burned out of control in the Amazon forest for twomonths
last year may look like kindling the next time around. Runawayindustrial
energy consumption plays out in everyone else's atmosphere,and so do the
fires in the Amazon. The carbon dioxide emissions ofAmazon fires may be
close to 10 percent of the world total.
WHAT CAN BE DONE?
In order to change the way things are headed in tropical forests,people
and organizations in the United States have to work with alliesthat are
there, who can do something about it and who have a realinterest in
changing the status quo.
Indigenous peoples in the Amazon have made major gains over the
lastdecade. Leaders such as Davi Yanomami, Ailton Krenak, Jose Adalberto
Macuxi, Euclides Macuxi and many others have built the alliancesneeded to
move the Brazilian government to recognize 20 percent of theAmazon-an area
twice the size of California-as indigenous territory.This is the largest
expanse of tropical forest protected anywhere.Indians in Colombia, Peru
and Ecuador have also won substantial gainsin recognition of their land
rights. While many areas are invaded andleaders sell timber and strike
deals with miners, protectingindigenous land in the Amazon objectively
halts deforestation.
Many around the world remember Chico Mendes, the rubber-tapper unionleader
from the Amazon who was murdered ten years ago. He led themovement of
forest people who make a living collecting wild rubberlatex against
invading cattle ranchers. This was the first socialmovement to seek
alliance with indigenous organizations in the region.Neither Indians nor
rubber tappers look familiar to most people inNorth America, but they and
their colleagues have made significantgains in the last ten years. This
forest peoples movement and sectorsaligned with it have elected two state
governors in the Amazon-
something almost no one believed possible a few years ago.
Chico Mendes was killed creating a reserve for rubber tappers to livein
and manage sustainably-the first "extractive reserve." The idea forthese
reserves was drawn from indigenous reserves. The NationalCouncil of Rubber
Tappers that he founded has created 21 of thesereserves. A glance at the
satellite images shows that Indian areas andextractive reserves actually
stop deforestation on the Amazonfrontier. The Council of Rubber Tappers is
honoring the tenthanniversary of Mendes' assassination with a campaign for
newextractive reserves-the council wants 10 percent of the Amazon
asextractive reserves by 2002-and for policies to make these and theIndian
lands sustainable and economically viable.
The rainforest is not destroyed. It is shrinking but there is stilltime to
do plenty about it. The Amazon is a forest almost half thesize of the
continental United States, well more than three-quartersintact. We have an
historic opportunity to build strong constituenciesfor protection and
sustainability before the natural ecosystem hasbeen practically
eliminated.
Accelerating Destruction
Probably the most significant new data on forests worldwide in the1990s is
the result of the work of the Woods Hole Research Instituteteam on fire in
the Amazon (Nepstad et al. 1999). Woods Hole hasdemonstrated that more
forest destruction and degradation is occurringin the Amazon than is seen
by the satellite images.
For every acre of forest cleared and burned, at least another acre
iseither degraded by selective logging or damaged by runaway groundfires,
or both. Current satellite images register clearing andburning, but not
selective logging or ground fires. In El Nixo years,this fire-induced
damage is even greater. This research in factpredicted the unprecedented
kind of fire that occurred in Roraima in1998, when primary moist tropical
forest burned as a result of runawayfire from deforestation. Previously,
moist tropical forest has beenfire-resistant, because of the ability of
deep root systems to tapsubsoil water reserves. The 1997-1998 El Nixo,
however, depleted thesubsoil water enough so that the forest became
flammable.
El Nixo events may become more frequent as a result of global
climatechange (Nepstad et al. 1999). Exacerbating the problem, forest
onceburned is much more likely to burn again. As is the case
withdeforestation rates, the effects of logging and ground fires have
beenbest studied in Brazil (even if much more research is needed
there).But as massive fires in Indonesia and Mexico demonstrated,
thephenomenon is far more widely distributed.
The prospect of climate change inducing drier conditions in
tropicalforests-leading to larger and more destructive fires, which in
turnspeeds climate change, provoking a vicious circle of drying,
fires,more drying, greater conflagrations-all represents a
qualitativechange in the process of forest destruction. Previously,
essentiallyall discussion of the issue has been grounded in the
deforestationdata-the area cleared and burned as registered in Landsat
images. Fireitself, under conditions of climate change, may threaten much
greaterareas of forest much more quickly than deforestation per se.
In addition, local deforestation or burning reduces the leaf
surfaceavailable for evapo-transpiration, or the cycling of rainwater
throughplants and trees back into the atmosphere. Since evapo-
transpirationaccounts for about half of the rain that falls on the Amazon
forest,increasing deforestation could lead to reduced rainfall on a
locallevel, further exacerbating a cycle of more drying and greater fires.
The most extensive exercise in analyzing the state of the world'sforest
cover is the world forest map compiled by the WorldConservation Monitoring
Center (WCMC 1997). By this analysis roughlyhalf of the world's original
primary forest is now gone-and adisproportionate share of this has been
lost in the last threedecades. The largest remaining areas of primary
forest are expanses ofboreal forest covering parts of Siberia and northern
Canada, and thetropical forests of the Amazon and Guyana shield region.
Most sourcesagree that primary temperate forest has virtually disappeared
(WCMC1997; FAO 1997).
Stephan Schwartzman is a senior scientist with the InternationalProgram of
the Environmental Defense Fund in Washington DC.
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This document is a PHOTOCOPY for educational, personal and non-commercial
use only. Recipients should seek permission from thesource for
reprinting. All efforts are made to provide accurate,timely pieces;
though ultimate responsibility for verifying allinformation rests with the
reader. Check out our Gaia's ForestConservation Archives & Portal at URL=
http://forests.org/ Networked by Forests.org, Inc.,
grb...@students.wisc.edu
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FIRST PEOPLES & NATURE FIRST!