Acre is the Westernmost Brazilian state, and neighbor to Amazonas and Rondônia, spanning about 55,000 square miles. Its capital Rio Branco is home to the 288, 907 of the total 438,489 denizens (1996). The whole of Acre is contained within the Amazon Basin and 93% of it is tropical rain forest. Notwithstanding the great extent of deforestation, the biodiversity of Acre and the surrounding Amazon Basin remains extensive; there are the mammoth trees, countless species of palm trees, vines, bushes, ferns; there are copaíba, Brazil-nuts, various fruits such as cupuaçu and graviola; species of insects, fish, the parrots, araras and other birds, so rare that scientists have yet to describe them; there are cicadas, caimans, the rays, the land-and sweet-water turtles, tapirs, the monkeys, and jaguars.
First Rubber Tappers
The first upsurge of immigration to the Brazilian Amazon resulted from the European and North American industries' need for rubber at the end of the 19th century. "Seringalistas " as the owners of the new rubber companies, would acquire huge areas of the Brazilian rain forest in order to extract the raw material for the rubber (the latex from the rubber trees). This "rubber boom," which brought wealth to the cities of Belem and Manaus, was eliminated with the British rubber production in Malaysia. Therefore, many of the Seringalistas went bankrupt and returned to the northeast.
Once again this condition was reversed during the Second World War, when the Japanese, who were allied with the Germans, usurped the Malaysian plantations. In order to conduct war one must have a supply of rubber, so rubber was once again in high demand in order to supply the allies against the Germans with rubber. People from northeast Brazil returned to extract rubber, which caused the second wave of immigration from the northeast. This time the flood of people was termed the "rubber soldiers" because they had the choice either to go to war against the Germans or become rubber tappers (people who extract latex sap trees and later dry the sap to create rubber).
Development of the Amazon
Brazil had an uncharted frontier to conquer, but the Amazon was in the way. So the Brazilian government resolved to encourage the clearing of forests and the conversion of previous forestland to pastures via tax benefits and direct subsidies. "With government subsidy in one hand and a chain saw in the other, ranchers and colonists advanced over the rain forest at a frightening pace," felling and burning 23,000 square kilometers (8,880 sq.
Wright, David, Heather LaRocca, and Grant DeJongh. "Global Problems." The Amazonian Rainforest: Forest to Farmland? The University of Michigan, 2007. Web. 14 Mar. 2014.
This policy memo addresses the development and expansion of the cattle ranching industry in Brazil, which has contributed to the mass deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon in the last 40 years. It exposes the regional and global consequences to deforestation and provides strategies for the Brazilian government to sustainably manage cattle ranching industries while protecting the future of the Amazon. The rainforest ecosystem is an immense reserve of natural recourses that is far more valuable than the beef produced on Brazilian cattle ranches. Not only does the rainforest create habitat for up to 65% of the world’s biodiversity, but when harvested sustainably, it provides humans with an abundance of spices, foods, oils, medicines and vital research areas (NEWMAN).
The Amazon Rain Forest crosses several national boundaries in South America, although the majority of it is located in Brazil. It covers over 3,562,000 acres, making it the largest in the world. But globally, over 138,600 acres of rain forest are lost each year to deforestation, 50,000 of those in Brazil alone (Holdsforth), and the world's rain forests are quickly disappearing. Deforestation in the Amazon occurs primarily for three reasons: clear-cutting, fragmentation, and edge effects.
This is how the rubber boom really got started. The huge demand was met by the rubber trees of Amazonia. The region which was hitherto poor and sparsely populated suddenly saw heaps of wealth. Many banks and companies opened in Brazilian towns of Belem and Manaus; and the poor jungle towns soon become rich, sophisticated, progressive urban centres, with a cosmopolitan population that patronized the theatre, literary societies, and luxury stores, and supported good schools. In Brazilian history, this period is called “Belle Époque” period and its splendour has been widely portrayed in art and literature of that country.
When the Portuguese landed in Brazil 500 years ago the sight that greeted them was of a huge rain forest, which then ran along much of Brazil’s Atlantic coast. In more recent times, there has been an outcry over the destruction of the much larger Amazon forest. But its devastation is nothing compared to Brazil’s Atlantic forest. About 86% of Brazil’s Amazon forest is still intact but only about 7% of the Atlantic forest remains. In this paper, I will explain why the Atlantic forest was destroyed, why deforestation happens, and the effects of rain forest destruction and the effect it is having on the Earth.
...auch, S. (2006). Industrial development on logging frontiers in the Brazilian Amazon. International Journal of Sustainable Development, 9(3), 277-296.
I - Amazônia –states Amazonas, Pará, Mato Grosso, Maranhão, Tocantins, Rondônia, Acre, Roraima and Amapá;
Federative Republic of Brazil, Brazil, is the fifth largest country in the world, both by geographical area and population. It is also the largest country in South America, bounded by Atlantic Ocean on the east. Brazil has a coastline of about 7,500 km and shares a border with almost every country in South America and covers half the continent. Brazil has an extensive river systems, with eight major drainage basins, all of which drain into the Atlantic Ocean. Two of these basins--the Amazon and Tocantins-Araguaia--account for more than half the total drainage area. The largest river in Brazil is the Amazon, which originates in the Andes and its tributaries covers 45.7 percent of the country, principally the north and west. Despite its large territorial region, population is mostly concentrated in few urban cities of its coast, like Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo Salvador and João Pessoa. The interior region of the Brazil is mostly covered by rainforest basin of Amazon which remains sparsely settled.
Nowadays deforestation is the one of the most important and controversial environmental issues in the world. Deforestation is cutting down, clearing away or burning trees or forests. Particularly tropical rainforests are the most waning type of forests because of its location in developing countries such as Indonesia, the Philippines, India, central African countries and Brazil. Deforestation rate in those regions is high enough to worry about, because of large economic potential of forest areas. As the result of causes such as agriculture land expansion, logging for timber, fire blazing and settling infrastructure there might be serious impacts in future. For instance, extinction of endemic species of animals and plants which will be feral, increase of greenhouse gas emissions which may lead to global warming and consecutive catastrophes, destruction of home for indigenous residents which is considered as violation of human rights. Some people can argue with these drawbacks telling that deforestation have more valuable benefits such as growth of economics, production of food and providing better opportunities for life for poor families. However, these benefits are quite temporary and government of that countries and world organisations tries to halt deforestation proposing several solutions. Deforestation problem is especially acute in the Brazilian Amazon, where its rate is much high comparing with other regions. This paper will describe world-wide rainforests, causes and effects of deforestation, and evaluate possible solutions of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon.
Brazil is located in Eastern South America, bordering the Atlantic Ocean. It is slightly smaller than the U.S., with bordering countries Argentina, Bolivia, Columbia, French Guyana, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela. It has many natural resources, including bauxite, gold, iron ore, manganese, nickel, phosphates, platinum, tin, uranium, petroleum, hydropower, and timber. The climate is tropical in the north, but temperate in the south. The terrain consists of mostly flat to rolling lowlands, with some plains, hills, mountains, and a narrow coastal belt. In recent years, environmentalists have become increasingly concerned over the future of the Amazon region, where human life has threatened the world's largest intact rain forest. Brasilia is the capital and main source of modern industry.
Conversion of the tropical forest into cropland and pasture began a long time ago in Ecuador, before their secession from Spain. Their major crop was cocoa, which was grown along the waterways to be exported out as their main source of trade. Due to the fact that after World War II expansion accelerated throughout the northwestern section of the forest, a highway system was put into construction. At this point in time, the Ecuadorian Amazon consisted of a few small towns that had been established in valleys and at the base of the mountains. Indigenous g...
In the early 1970's, the Brazillian military urged people to allocate to new land in hopes of more modern society that would allieviate poverty and encourage social stability in other areas of the country by having the people move to what they thought was empty land. They ignored the already in place indigenous people that have for many centuries, as we learned in the book "Nature Across Cultures", have shaped the past and the development of the Amazonia through Indigenous knowledge. The ancestors of their ancestors are responsible for creating the vast
Agriculture is one of the most important sectors in Brazilian economy, accounting for 22 % of the country’s GDP. Brazil is one of the few countries that is self-sufficient in basic food crops and is a leading exporter of sugar, coffee, orange juice, soybean, beef, tobacco, ethanol in the world. About one-third of the world’s oranges are grown in Brazil - more than twice the amount produced in the United States, which is the world’s second largest supplier. That means, Brazil is very important globally as a source of food security and environmental sustainability; it contains 13.5 % of the world’s potential arable land and 15.2 % of the world’s renewable water resources. 1
Brazil is a diverse and enormous country. There are large, medium and small sized aities that stretch from coast. From Brazilian cit...
This report will discuss the effects of deforestation in the Amazon Rainforest on the people and Environment and suggest possible solutions for deforestation. The Amazon Rainforest located near Brazil is being cut down at a rate of roughly 10,000km every year according to Source 1. Deforestation is affecting the entire planet.