Should deforestation be allowed in the Amazon River Basin in order to provide for its economic needs?

Question

Please Elaborate on Why or Why not... Thanks

Answer 1

Unfortunately, the world needs to come to grips with the fact that Brazil will continue to log rain forest in the Amazon and convert land into low-output farm or range lands. Tropical rainforest soils are very low in nutrients and threir conversion has serious, probably global, consequences. There seems to be a pretty good consensus about the problem, but it's not just a simple matter of "big corporations" (they play their part) and a ruined environment.

Besides the big corporations logging, there are a host of small companies that selectively log the most valuable trees. This has caused the "under count" by many thousands of acres of logged land. (ref. 1) Often once an area is opened up even in a rudimentary way, subistence "slash and burn" farmers follow, often causing large regional fires. (ref. 2) These are very poor, often uneducated, people who see few alternatives to their life style. Eventualy, the depleted land often ends up in large ranches. Those who even try to regulate logging do so at considerable risk as the profits from logging and land conversion are huge.(ref. 3). Last year saw the worst drought in memory in the Amazon, showing that the environment may have reaced a point of no return. (ref.4)

To this person, there is no easy solution. Brazil is a poor country where many of the people live on less than $2 a day. Nobody has the authority to tell them to stop logging other than the Brazilian government, and even then it is doubtful that such a ban could be enforced given the poverty and lawless conditions in the Amazon. It's like telling the Columbian's to stop growing coca - the US has spent millions on that effort with little effect. The solution (if there is one) is to end the demand for tropical hardwood, because it's not just Brazil but every tropical forest that is disappearing fast. This means providing people with an alternate way to make a living. The developed world needs to spend the money to give the workers in the Amazon (and other extraction-based poor countries) decent life choices that are sustainable along with a stake in a better world. I invite you to visit the one.org website which discusses their campaign to do just this. (www.one.org). Actions speak louder than words. I have given my favorite organizations site as the last reference, but there are many working for global equity and justice. Environmental problems in developing countries simply cannot be addressed about without dealing with issues of poverty, disease, and lack of education.

Answer 2

A major cause of deforestation in the Amazon basin is the fact that many farmers in the area use a technique called "slash and burn". They cut down the rain forest and burn the area clear. They then farm this area till the soil is exhausted. Instead of replenishing the soil, these farmers just move on to a new area of the rain forest and start again. This destroys the rain forest and leaves the soil in very poor condition.

Answer 3

The deforestation of the basin is been carried out by big business and in no way helps the economy of the region ,in fact it is the reverse where once you had a thriving forest which provided the indigenous population with a living you now have bare land where the soil is so thin and poor that it is impossible to grow crops, the only winner as i said is big business who have been known to resort to violence to clear the natives of the land before deforestation

Answer 4

How would you go about preventing such deforestation? Have you consulted any Brazilians on this question? Have you any practical or realistic alternatives to offer?

Answer 5

I think that deforestation sould not be allowed because we don't have many trees as it is, and if we get rid of more we'll be pure out of luck now won't we?

Answer 6

No. The rain forest is one of the ways that carbon dioxide is sequestered out of the atmosphere. Less forest means less is being absorbed.

That's only one of many reasons. Other reasons include destroying biodiversity, species extinction, increased pollution, etc. .

~X~

Answer 7

No bio-diversity is more so when you get closer to the tropics and when you take this away you risk losing new posibilities of new species and cancer remedies, it also is a beautiful place to visit.

Answer 8

I don't think. Because rainforests are a very important type of ecosystem.

Answer 9

The age-old advise is "do not mess with nature".