"Get your oil company out of our protected areas"

Amazon Rainforest, seen from the Alto Madre de Dios river, in Peru.Photo:Martin St-Amant /WikipediaAs deadline approaches, tensions rise again in the Peruvian Amazon

In a recent open letter to Hunt Oil Company President Ray Hunt, the Native Federation of the Río Madre de Dios (FENAMAD) gave Hunt until this week to leave the Amarakaeri Communal Reserve in the southern Peruvian Amazon as a condition to continuing any further talks with the indigenous communities living in the Reserve area.

Falling Amazon deforestation helps in saving other forests

View of Amazon basin forest north of Manaus, Brazil. Photo: Phil P. Harris/WikimediaFewer trees were cut down in the Amazon this year, creating an opportunity to apply sound government policies to halt deforestation in other damaged forests, WWF says.

Data released recently by the Brazilian government shows that the deforestation rate in the Amazon fell between August 2008 and July 2009. Overall, the deforested region is a 45 per cent smaller than Amazon land cleared the previous year, or between August 2007 and July 2008.

This is the lowest rate of deforestation in the Amazon since record-keeping began in 2000, and down from a high of more than 27,000 square kms in 2004.

However, the Amazon did lose 7,008 square kms of forest this year, according to government officials and President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who attended a ceremony Thursday to announce this year’s deforestation figures.

According to Denise Hamú, WWF-Brazil's CEO, although it is essential to recognise the efforts made by the federal and state governments as well as Brazilian society in general, further action is required.

"Deforestation needs to continue falling in a sustainable manner and must take place in other Brazilian biomes in addition to the Amazon, such as the Cerrado", she stated.

Hamú also said that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, to be held in Copenhagen in December, will be a good opportunity for Brazil to defend the adoption of clear and ambitious emission reduction commitments by the participant countries.

"Deforestation numbers such as the ones showed today by President Lula strengthen Brazil's credentials to lead the climate negotiations and take the forefront in building a new development model for the world that respects the environment and the people", Hamú said.

Among the other biomes, the most critical situation is found in the Cerrado. While deforestation in the Amazon has finally fallen below 10,000 km2, in the Cerrado it surpasses 20,000 km2.

Despite conservation efforts, global deforestation continues at an alarming rate – 13 million hectares per year, or 36 football fields a minute. It generates almost 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and halting forest loss has been identified as one of the most cost-effective ways to keep the world out of the danger zone of runaway climate change.

According to Cláudio Maretti, WWF-Brazil's Conservation Director, apart from decreasing emissions caused by deforestation in the Amazon the country needs to work on achieving reductions in the industry and transport sectors, and especially in energy generation and transmission processes.

"After all, the planet urgently needs expressive greenhouse gas emission reductions", he said.

Positive efforts made by the Brazilian government that should be applied in other areas include: Creating and implementing protected areas, promoting sustainable forest management, restricting public credit for land grabbers and deforesters, and promoting land tenure regularisation actions. Also important are efforts to minimise the impacts of large-scale infrastructure projects such as roads and dams.

In addition, Maretti said it is essential to implement a consistent payment mechanism for ecological services - which consists in compensating producers who conserve the standing forest.

Paper giant pulls out of Indonesia rainforest destruction

While Greenpeace activists were detained by police overnight for taking direct action on Thursday to prevent Asia Pacific Resources International Holding Limited (APRIL) clearing Indonesia's rainforest, UPM-Kymmene announced that it will stop buying from the company, which is responsible for causing widespread rainforest and climate destruction.

The Greenpeace action took place as President Barack Obama prepares to fly to Asia for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), his first visit to the region as President, and as the United States continues to block progress ahead of the critical UN climate negotiations at Copenhagen next month.

The Finnish-owned company, which supplies products like photocopy paper to global markets including the US, China, Europe and Australia, admitted that APRIL's pulp "comes from a very delicate environment". Greenpeace estimates this contract to be equal to over 4 per cent of APRIL's total pulp production, worth over USD55 million annually.

"This is a very positive move by UPM to help protect Indonesia's rainforests and carbon rich peatlands, the destruction of which is driving climate change, mass species extinction and causing poverty in forest dependent communities," said Bustar Maitar, Greenpeace Southeast Asia's rainforest campaigner.

"As international companies start distancing them from this environmental disaster, the call the end global deforestation here and around the globe will only get louder and louder. It is not only one of the quickest and most cost effective ways to combat climate change but is essential in order to avert runway climate change in our lifetime."

Yesterday, activists from Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Brazil and Finland shut down APRIL's operations in the heart of the Indonesian rainforest on the island of Sumatra. They locked themselves to seven machines used to clear vast tracts of forest and peatland for conversion to pulp wood plantations. Other activists unfurled a huge banner in a freshly destroyed area of rainforest that read "Obama: you can stop this", urging him to join other world leaders and help avert a climate crisis by ending global deforestation, responsible for about a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Earlier this week, Greenpeace released fresh evidence, including aerial surveillance images that prove APRIL is destroying areas of rainforest and draining forest peatland on Sumatra's threatened Kampar Peninsula. The evidence also strongly indicates that the company is clearing forest on peat which is more than 3 metres deep. This is illegal under Indonesian law.

Over a million hectares of forest, mostly tropical rainforest, is destroyed every month – that is an area of forest the size of a football pitch every two seconds. Rainforest and peatland destruction in Indonesia emits such huge quantities of CO₂ that is has driven the country to become the world's third largest climate polluter after China and the US.

"President Obama, Yudhoyono and other world leaders must listen and take action to pull us back from the brink of a climate crisis. They must attend the UN climate summit and agree to a fair, ambitious and binding deal that includes ending the destruction of the world's rainforests," concluded Maitar.

Innovative plan to save rainforest, reduce greenhouse gas emissions

An innovative proposal by the Ecuadorian government to protect an untouched, oil rich region of Amazon rainforest is a precedent-setting and potentially economically viable approach, says a team of environmental researchers from the University of Maryland, the World Resources Institute and Save America's Forests.

The Ecuadorian proposal, known as the Yasuní-ITT Initiative, would protect a large area of pristine Amazon rainforest, by leaving untouched nearly one billion barrels of oil that lies beneath the Yasuní National Park in Ecuador. Under the initiative, the government would sell certificates linked to the value of the unreleased carbon to provide alternative revenue to that which would come from exploiting the oil reserves.

"This is a really novel approach that could fund a lot of rainforest protection," said Clinton Jenkins, a research scientist in the University of Maryland's department of biology. "It's also an innovative way of dealing with greenhouse gas emissions."

"There has been a lot of talk about engineering ways to reduce or offset greenhouse gas emissions by removing carbon from air and burying, or sequestering, it in the ground. This approach sequesters carbon by preventing oil from ever getting out of the ground," said Jenkins.

Writing about the Yasuní-ITT Initiative in a new article in the scientific journal Biotropica, Jenkins, Matt Finer of Save America's Forests and Remi Moncel with the Climate and Energy Program of the World Resources Institute, say that a number of climate researchers, including NASA scientist James Hansen, have suggested that forgoing extraction of oil and gas reserves in remote or sensitive places could be an important piece to a larger global strategy designed to limit carbon emissions and that this Initiative "is the first real offer to do just that."

"Oil and gas concessions now cover vast swaths of the mega-diverse western Amazon," said Finer, lead author of Biotropica review article. "Ecuador´s revolutionary initiative is the first major government-led effort to buck this disturbing trend."

According to estimates of Ecuadorian officials cited in the article, preventing exploitation of the ITT oil fields, will keep 410 million metric tons of CO₂ out of the atmosphere.

The authors note that use of a conservation strategy like that proposed by Ecuador would be particularly beneficial in areas that also offer great ecological value. The Yasuní National Park has such multiple benefits, they say, because it is one of the most biodiverse parts of the Amazon and within the territory of some of the world's last un-contacted indigenous peoples, the Tagaeri and Taromenane.

"Yasuní is an exceptional place in the world, biologically incredible, home to un-contacted peoples, and yet - perhaps tragically - full of oil," said Jenkins. "Society faces a test of what we value more, drilling for more oil, or preserving a cherished national park and the people who call it home."

Sceptics and advocates

The Ecuadorian proposal has been lauded widely for its three-pronged effort to protect biodiversity, respect indigenous peoples' territory, and combat climate change. However, Jenkins, Finer and Moncel note that the Yasuní-ITT Initiative also has ardent sceptics.

For example, how to pay for the effort is in question. Ecuador, a country highly dependent on oil export revenues, seeks USD350 million for each of the next 10 years in alternative revenue. Ecuador's intent is to sell certificates linked to the value of the unreleased carbon. This raises a number of technical questions, however, such as the possibility that the initiative would not result in a net global CO₂ reduction if the certificates were traded in carbon markets.

"The best way to minimise the risk associated with the carbon bonds is to encourage supporters to make direct donations," said Remi Moncel of the World Resources Institute. "While less problematic from the point of view of environmental integrity, it is harder to raise money that way."

Germany appears to be a leading supporter of the Yasuní-ITT Initiative. Recent news reports indicate the German government may donate USD50 to USD70 million annually to the initiative if other countries also agree to provide support for the initiative.

Additional questions tackled in the study include why a national park is on the chopping block in the first place and what mechanisms are needed to prevent future Ecuadorian administrations from drilling the oil fields.

The authors conclude that the Yasuní-ITT Initiative, with its focus on generating alternative revenue, is a potentially precedent-setting advance in avoiding damaging oil and gas development in sensitive areas and an innovative way to address climate change.

"The climate conference of Copenhagen is only weeks away. What Ecuador has proposed is a good example of how each country can come up with home-grown, nationally relevant ideas to promote sustainable development," said Moncel.

Authors Finer and Jenkins recently published a companion study entitled, "Ecuador's Yasuní Biosphere Reserve: a brief modern history and conservation challenges." It is a concise history of the Yasuní region designed to help people better understand this complicated part of the world.

Tackling climate change at frontline of Indonesian rainforest destruction

Photo: WikimediaInglourious Basterds star Mélanie Laurent joins the action

Fifty Greenpeace activists have taken action to prevent the destruction of Indonesia's rainforests and called on world leaders to end global deforestation, which is responsible for about a fifth of all greenhouse gas emissions. The call came as negotiators meet in Barcelona, Spain for the final round of talks before December's critical UN climate summit in Copenhagen.

Greenpeace activists completed the construction of a dam across one of the many canals built to drain the rainforest and peat soils in order to make way for plantations on the Kampar Peninsula on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. This destruction emits huge quantities of CO₂ and has led Indonesia to become the world's third largest climate polluter after China and the US.

Greenpeace and members of the local forest community have spent the last week constructing the dam and were assisted over the weekend by Mélanie Laurent, star of Quentin Tarantino's new film Inglourious Basterds.

"Forest destruction is one of the main causes of climate change. That is why I came here to the frontline of forest destruction with Greenpeace, to call on world leaders to end deforestation both here and around the globe. It is key to preventing a climate catastrophe," said Mélanie Laurent, speaking from the rainforest.

Greenpeace has set up a 'Climate Defenders' Camp', in the heart of the Indonesian rainforest and intends to continue constructing dams across the Kampar Peninsula, which stores some 2 billion tonnes of carbon, in coming weeks as December's UN climate summit approaches.

"We are taking action to stop climate change right here at the frontline of forest destruction. To pull the world back from the brink of a climate crisis, we need Obama, Merkel, Sarkozy, Brown and other world leaders to commit to much deeper cuts in emissions from fossil fuels and to provide the critical funds needed to end deforestation. If they fail, we will face mass species extinction, floods, droughts and famine in our lifetime," said Greenpeace Southeast Asia campaigner Bustar Maitar.

Greenpeace will release an Indonesian Forest Fund plan at the climate meeting in Barcelona at 18.00 CET. The plan shows how the fund could help rapidly reduce emissions from deforestation.

Finding a common cause in climate change, forest conservation

The presidents of Liberia and Sierra Leone have further underlined their commitment to protect the Gola Rainforest. Photo: Alex Hipkiss; RSPBPresident Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia and President Ernest Bai Koroma of Sierra Leone have further underlined their commitment to a Transboundary Peace Park Project to protect the Gola Rainforest, during a press event at the fourth European Development Days Conference in Stockholm.

The presidents' press statement at the European Development Days Conference strongly noted the effect of climate change on their countries and noted that "Through the Transboundary Peace Park Project we have demonstrated our commitment to be part of the solution."

Both presidents reiterated their commitment by stating that "this project is therefore a symbol of our renewed commitment to peace and stability in the sub-region" and that this is a "joint commitment to forest conservation and the fight against climate change."

The Presidents also strongly positioned themselves in supporting the UN Reducing Emissions from Deforestation in Developing Countries (REDD), which focuses on joint cooperation between developed and developing countries to avert deforestation.

The presidents ended their statement by saying that "there is every reason for us to protect the Gola Forest on both sides of the border, since doing so will ensure that it will continuously provide ecological services to the surrounding communities. A protected Gola Forest will further increase the resilience of the ecosystem to climate change and play an important role in global climate stabilisation."

This event closely follows the Launch in May 2009, by the two presidents of the Transboundary Peace Park Project. The May launch was held in Lalehun, on the border of the Gola Forest in Sierra Leone. The Peace Park will establish a huge protected area covering over 2,000 km2 that will protect one of the largest remaining frontiers of the Upper Guinea Rainforest. These rainforests, as well as holding vast carbon stores that will help in the fight against climate change, also are home to some of the world's most threatened species of wildlife such as Pygmy Hippo, Forest Elephant and 14 species of threatened birds.

The Peace Park unites the Gola Forest Reserve in Sierra Leone (75,000 ha) and the Lofa and Foya Forest Reserves in Liberia (80,000 ha and 100,000 ha respectively), with additional forest to provide corridors for the movement of wildlife between them.

The work to establish the Peace Park has involved several conservation organisations in the BirdLife International Partnership, the two national BirdLife Partners (Conservation Society of Sierra Leone and Society for the Conservation of Nature in Liberia), the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK), Vogelbescherming (BirdLife in The Netherlands), working together with the Forest Development Authority (FDA) of Liberia, and the Forestry Division in Sierra Leone.

The BirdLife Partnership, which is already working on a 4.2 million Euro project to protect Sierra Leone’s Gola Forest, funded by the European Union (EU) and FFEM (French Government), has secured an additional 3.2 million Euros to fund the four-year project to establish the 200,000 ha protected area from the EU, with the balance made up from the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF), and the Sustainable & Thriving Environments for West African Regional Development (STEWARD) Program of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the US Forest Service, International Programs. CEPF is a joint initiative of Conservation International, the French Development Agency, the government of Japan, the Global Environment Facility, the MacArthur Foundation and the World Bank.

SKY and WWF to help save one billion Amazon rainforest trees

Photo: Martin St-AmantSky and WWF have launched a three-year campaign to help save one billion trees in the Amazon. The campaign, Sky Rainforest Rescue, aims to protect rainforest covering over three million hectares in the state of Acre, Brazil to help combat climate change and preserve the unique habitat and species of the Amazon.

The world’s rainforests are a crucial resource needed to avoid dangerous climate change, as well as a vital ecosystem supporting rich biodiversity. But today in the Amazon alone an area the size of three football pitches is destroyed every minute.

Deforestation is causing more greenhouse gas emissions than all the planes, trains, ships and cars in the world put together. Loss of tropical forests is also threatening the habitat of over 50 per cent of the world’s species and the welfare of some of the world’s poorest populations.

Sky and WWF want to work with the British public to help stop the destruction. They are calling for donations at www.sky.com/rainforestrescue, with every 10 pound helping to save 500 trees. To kick start the project, Sky will match donations pound for pound, up to a joint target of 4 million pound. WWF and Sky are also in discussions with funding bodies with the aim of securing further financial support for the project.

Working with the State Government of Acre, Sky and WWF aim to create economic incentives for the local communities that help make the trees worth more alive than dead. The project will enhance Acre’s monitoring capabilities against threats including illegal logging and forest clearance; help local producers to secure fair prices and find new market opportunities for sustainable goods; and establish payments for environmental services, including support for community enterprises. The initial phase will comprise research and consultation with local groups, before a pilot project is launched in early 2010, which will then be grown to scale.

To support Sky Rainforest Rescue, Sky1 documentary maker Ross Kemp will visit the Amazon rainforest to investigate the reality of deforestation for two documentaries to be broadcast on Sky1 HD in Spring 2010.

This is an example of the wide range of rainforest-focused programming that Sky and its channel partners will be broadcasting across the duration of the campaign. The first programmes to hit the air include ‘Children of the Amazon’ (on Sky 1 and Sky Anytime) and ‘Rivers and Life’ (on Nat Geo Wild HD and Sky Anytime), part of Sky’s ‘Rainforest Week’, which starts on Monday 26 October 2009.

Sky CEO Jeremy Darroch said: “Rainforests are crucial to the fight against dangerous climate change. Yet, an area the size of three football pitches is being destroyed every minute in the Amazon alone. We’re asking everyone to join us to help stop this destruction by donating to Sky Rainforest Rescue. To kick start the project we’re committing to match your donation pound for pound until we reach our target of £4 million.”

David Nussbaum, Chief Executive of WWF-UK, added: “Deforestation is not only threatening the survival of species and habitats but is also exacerbating the devastating effects of climate change. WWF and Sky together with the help of the public, can take real steps to halt rainforest destruction, benefit communities and provide a blueprint for future forest management.”

Binho Marques, State Governor of Acre, said: “With 88 per cent of Acre covered by rainforest, we are the stewards of a precious global resource. Our aim is to ensure we develop a sustainable model for protection which works with the needs of our 2,000 isolated rural forest local communities. Sky Rainforest Rescue is critical to our ability to do that.”

Carbon-offsetting and conservation: Potential winners in rainforest

Logged rainforests can support as much plant, animal and insect life as virgin forest within 15 years if properly managed, research at the University of Leeds has found.

Because trees in tropical climates soak up large amounts of carbon dioxide, restoring logged forest through planting new trees could also be used in carbon trading, according to Dr David Edwards, from University's Faculty of Biological Sciences. Dr Edwards is calling for the inclusion of biodiversity-friendly strategies in carbon trading schemes to ensure that carbon off-setting projects support, rather than undermine, rainforest conservation.

Currently, large plantations of one type of tree, such as Eucalpytus, are popular as carbon off-setting or sequestration projects in the tropics because they also provide commercial benefits, but they do not support tropical biodiversity.

But Dr Edwards has shown that managed restoration of logged forest – which can also be used for carbon off-setting – brings biodiversity virtually back to pre-logging levels within 15 years, much quicker than forest left to regenerate naturally.

"Our research shows that it is possible to have both carbon sequestration and biodiversity benefits within the same scheme," he said.

"This could act as a strong incentive to protect logged forests under threat of deforestation for oil palm and other such crops. Selectively logged rainforests are often vulnerable because they're seen as degraded, but we've shown they can support similar levels of biodiversity to unlogged forests."

The research compared biodiversity of birds in three adjoining areas of tropical forest in the north-east of Borneo. One is the oldest and largest area of rehabilitated forest in the tropics, logged around 20 years ago and with over 10,000 ha actively rehabilitated for the past fifteen; another is a naturally regenerating area of forest, logged at the same time; and the third, a conservation area of unlogged forest.

The findings showed that the number and range of species of birds in rehabilitated tropical forest recovered to levels very close to those found in unlogged forest after just 15 years. Forest that was left to regenerate naturally after selective logging showed less diversity.

"There are now suggestions that carbon crediting and 'biodiversity banking' should be combined, enabling extra credits for projects that offer a biodiversity benefit," said Dr Edwards. "We believe this should be introduced as soon as possible, to ensure maximum support for rehabilitation schemes in the tropical rainforest."

Plant fossils give first real picture of earliest Neotropical rainforests

Photo: WikimediaA team of researchers including a University of Florida palaeontologist has used a rich cache of plant fossils discovered in Colombia to provide the first reliable evidence of how Neotropical rainforests looked 58 million years ago.

Researchers from the Smithsonian Institution and UF, among others, found that many of the dominant plant families existing in today’s Neotropical rainforests – including legumes, palms, avocado and banana – have maintained their ecological dominance despite major changes in South America’s climate and geological structure.

The study, which appears this week in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, examined more than 2,000 megafossil specimens, some nearly 10 feet long, from the Cerrejón Formation in northern Colombia. The fossils are from the Paleocene epoch, which occurred in the 5- to 7-million-year period following the massive extinction event responsible for the demise of the dinosaurs.

“Neotropical rainforests have an almost nonexistent fossil record,” said study co-author Fabiany Herrera, a graduate student at the Florida Museum of Natural History on the UF campus. “These specimens allow us to actually test hypotheses about their origins for the first time ever.”

Herrera said the new specimens, discovered in 2003, also provide information for future studies that promise to provide an even stronger understanding of the plants that formed the earliest Neotropical communities.

Many previous assumptions and hypotheses on the earliest rainforests are based on studies of pollen fossils, which did not provide information about climate, forest structure, leaf morphology or insect herbivory.

The new study provides evidence Neotropical rainforests were warmer and wetter in the late Paleocene than today but were composed of the same plant families that now thrive in rainforests. “We have the fossils to prove this,” Herrera said. “It is also intriguing that while the Cerrejón rainforest shows many of the characteristics of modern equivalents, plant diversity is lower.”

The site, one of the world’s largest open-pit coal mines, also yielded the fossil for the giant snake known as Titanoboa, described by UF scientists earlier this year.

“These new plant fossils show us that the forest during the time of Titanoboa, 58 million years ago, was similar in many ways to that of today,” said Florida Museum vertebrate palaeontologist Jonathan Bloch, who described Titanoboa but was not part of the rainforest study. “Like Titanoboa, which is clearly related to living boas and anacondas, the ancient forest of northern Colombia had similar families of plants as we see today in that ecosystem. The foundations of the Neotropical rainforests were there 58 million years ago.”

Megafossils found at the Cerrejón site made it possible to use leaf structure to identify specimens down to the genus level. This resolution allowed the identification of plant genera that still exist in Neotropical rainforests. With pollen fossils, specimens can be categorised only to the family level.

Researchers were surprised by the relative lack of diversity found in the Paleocene rainforest, Herrera said. Statistical analyses showed that the plant communities found in the Cerrejón Formation were 60 per cent to 80 per cent less diverse than those of modern Neotropical rainforests. Evidence of herbivory also showed a low diversity level among insects.

The study’s authors say the relative lack of diversity indicates either the beginning of rainforest species diversification or the recovery of existing species from the Cretaceous extinction event.

The researchers estimate the Paleocene rainforest received about 126 inches of rainfall annually and had an average annual temperature greater than 86 degrees. The Titanoboa study, which used different methods, estimated an average temperature between 89 and 91 degrees. Today the region’s temperatures average about 81 degrees.

Herrera is now comparing fossils from the Cerrejón site to specimens from other Paleocene sites in Colombia to see how far the early rainforest extended geographically. He is also examining fossils from a Cretaceous site to determine differences in composition before and after the extinction event.

Writer: Bill Kanapaux

Cattle industry giants unite in banning Amazon destruction

Four of the largest players in the global cattle industry have joined forces to ban the purchase of cattle from newly deforested areas of the Brazilian Amazon from their supply chains.

At a high-level event in Sao Paulo organised by Greenpeace, meat companies JBS-Friboi, Bertin, Minerva and Marfrig declared the adoption of environmental and social standards to ensure their products are free from cattle raised in newly deforested areas of the rainforest.

The move follows the release of the Greenpeace report ‘Slaughtering the Amazon’ in June, which exposed the link between forest destruction and the expansion of cattle ranching in the Amazon, prompting calls for action from key international companies, including Adidas, Nike and Timberland, which committed to cancel contracts unless their products were guaranteed to be free from Amazon destruction, encouraging today’s move.

JBS-Friboi is both Brazil’s and the world’s largest beef producer and global exporter of processed beef. Bertin is the world’s largest leather exporter and Brazil’s second-largest beef exporter. Minerva is Brazil’s third largest beef exporter; Marfrig is the world's fourth largest beef producer.

The Brazilian Association of Supermarkets (ABRAS), which includes Walmart and Carrefour, attended the event and supported the call for zero deforestation.

Measures include the monitoring of their supply chains and clear targets for the registration of farms that both directly and indirectly supply cattle as well as measures to end the purchase of cattle from indigenous and protected areas and from farms using slave labour.

“This is an important step in the fight to stop the destruction of one of the world’s most critical rainforests and vital to helping tackle climate change,” said Paulo Adario, Greenpeace Amazon campaign director.

The Brazilian cattle sector, which occupies 80 per cent of all deforested areas of the Amazon, is the country’s leading carbon polluter.

The event was attended by Governor Blairo Maggi of the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso, which has the highest rate of deforestation in the Amazon and the largest cattle herd in Brazil. Maggi announced that the state would support efforts to protect the Amazon and would provide high-resolution satellite images for monitoring.

“This announcement shows that the cattle industry and a state government are doing their part. President Lula must now do his homework to improve Brazil's action plan to fight Amazon destruction, ensuring an end to deforestation by 2015, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and averting the impending climate crisis,” said Adario.

At the UN General Assembly in September, President Lula announced a target of 80 per cent reduction in deforestation by 2020 for Brazil.

In just 10 weeks’ time, governments around the world will meet in Copenhagen to agree a strong climate deal to avoid catastrophic climate change. Deforestation accounts for around 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, more than all the world’s trains, planes and cars put together. A good climate deal will only be effective if it successfully tackles emissions from both fossil fuels and deforestation.

Networking site to save rainforest

Photo: Sze Ning

Greens world over are taking to the worldwide web in order to help save the rainforests in alliance with corporates like Dell, PepsiCo China and Starbucks.

Campaigners announced the setting up of a social networking website, Team Earth, which they hope will unite businesses, NGOs, scientists, educators, individuals and children in an international collective action campaign to address the most pressing environmental issues facing humanity. The networking site will be launched in November.

Team Earth hopes to galvanise companies, powerful brands and other sections of society to take collective action at a global scale. Apart from its own platform, Team Earth will use social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.

By harnessing the power of social networking and global outreach to incite action, Team Earth’s initial collective action campaigns will focus on saving forests. Team Earth’s other partners include Harrah's, SC Johnson, Wrigley and Marriott International.

Along with Conservation International, Team Earth is supported by other non-profit partners include Rocky Mountain Institute and Prince’s Rainforest Project. Team Earth’s global online education partner, ePals, reaches 2.5 million registered users and millions of students in over 200 countries and territories.

Global warming threatens tropical species

Tropical rainforest in PeruTropical lizards detect the effects of global warming in a climate where the smallest change makes a big difference, according to herpetologist Laurie Vitt, curator of reptiles and George Lynn Cross Research Professor at the University of Oklahoma’s Sam Noble Museum of Natural History. Climate change caused by global warming threatens the very existence of these and other tropical species, the ecosystem and its by-products, Vitt maintains.

Vitt has studied the ecology of lizards in rain forests around the world and, for the past 20 years, as part of a biodiversity project in the Amazon.

As a fellow researcher on a study funded by the National Science Foundation, Vitt investigated the affects of global warming on tropical lizards and the diversity of the ecosystem. “We depend on these tropical lizards and other species of animals and plants for food, materials, and pharmaceuticals, but we are losing these species as a result of global warming,” Vitt remarks.

Tropical species are affected more by the very narrow temperature range of their typically warm climate than are ectotherms living where the temperatures fluctuate in greater degrees. Even the smallest change in the tropics makes a difference to the tropical species most susceptible to climate change. “Climatic shifts are part of our natural history, but years of research indicate global warming has increased the rate at which climate change is taking place, ” Vitt states.

As populations grow around the world, so does consumption. In the densest areas of the world, the elimination of animals that feed on disease vectors, such as mosquitoes and flies, adds to our growing human health problem. “The loss of these predators, like tropical species, upset the natural biodiversity of the ecosystem,” Vitt notes. “The effects may not be so obvious in the short term, but the long-term effects will be irreversible.”

Tropical rain forests contain most species of animals and plants needed to sustain the world’s population, but global warming has already upset the natural biodiversity of the ecosystem. An international debate over global warming ensues while the world’s population continues to grow. “At some point,” Vitt concludes, “we have to address the world’s growing population which doubles every 30 years.”

“Our ability to connect with nature and better understand tropical lizards is important because these animals serve as model organisms for detecting the effects of global warming,” Vitt summarizes. “Ecosystems are complex and interdependent. When one species becomes extinct, the entire system is affected. The long-term effects on human health can be dramatic.”

The story of Carajás

Photo: NASAFinding one of the world’s largest deposits of iron ore in a remote corner of the Amazon rainforest was something of an accident, according to mining-technology.com. In 1967, a helicopter carrying a team of geologists from a Brazilian subsidiary of U.S. Steel landed on a barren hilltop to refuel. The geologists recognised iron ore on the surface of the hill, and four decades later, one of the world’s largest iron ore mines had taken its place.

This image of the Carajás Iron Ore Mine was taken by the Advanced Land Imager on NASA’s EO-1 satellite on July 26, 2009. Terraced layers of red earth reveal the method of mining. Carajás is an open-pit mine, in which minerals are removed from the surface one layer at a time. In 2007, 296 million metric tons of iron ore were pulled from the mine. The mine is estimated to contain about 18 billion tons of iron ore, plus gold, manganese, copper, and nickel.

The Carajás Mine sits in the Carajás mountain range (Serra dos Carajás) in northeastern Brazil. The mountain terrain is still evident in the untouched land around the mine. The red-tan exposed earth contrasts with the deep green rainforest. Companhia Vale do Rio Doce, the company that runs the mine, preserves the forest immediately around the mine. The large image, which encompasses a broader area, shows deforestation north and east of the mine.


Illustration by Carlos Latuff

An Amnesty International report states: "On 17 April 1996, military police began clearing landless protesters from the PA-150 highway at Eldorado dos Carajás in the state of Pará. An hour later 19 people lay dead, many shot at close range; some hacked to death by the protesters’ own farm tools.

After a complex legal battle, 127 military police and 19 higher ranking officers went on trial in June 2002. All were absolved with the exception of Col. Mario Pantoja and Major José Maria Oliveira, both of whom remain at liberty while they fight a second appeal against their sentence."