Brazil: deforestation jumps in world’s largest savanna as scientists raise alarm
The Guardian
Destruction of trees, grasses and other plants in the Cerrado is a major source of Brazil’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Deforestation last year rose to the highest level since 2015 in Brazil’s Cerrado, prompting scientists on Monday to raise alarm over the state of the world’s most species-rich savanna and a major carbon sink that helps to stave off climate change.
The Cerrado, the world’s largest savanna spread across several states of Brazil, is often called an “upside-down forest” because of the deep roots its plants sink into the ground to survive seasonal droughts and fires. (...)
Destruction of these trees, grasses and other plants in the Cerrado is a large source of Brazil’s greenhouse gas emissions, although it is far less densely forested than the more famous Amazon rainforest that it borders. (...)
The added destruction is particularly concerning, scientists say, when considering that roughly half of the Cerrado has been destroyed since the 1970s, mostly for farming and ranching.
“You’re transforming thousands of square kilometers annually,” said Manuel Ferreira, a geographer at the Federal University of Goias.
“Few other places on earth have seen that rapid of a transformation.” (...)
An aerial view shows a dead tree near a forest on the border between Amazonia and Cerrado. Photograph: Amanda Perobelli/Reuters.
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