The Amazon should be reforested: ‘conserving’ is no longer enough

According to data from the National Institute for Amazonian Research (INPA), from 1985 to 2017 the Amazon biome lost more than 870,000 km2 of trees, an area equal to France, the United Kingdom and Belgium put together. As well as causing an inevitable loss of biodiversity and damaging the habitat of thousands of species, deforestation has a negative effect on the climate, turning the planet’s green lungs from CO2 reservoirs into dangerous emitters.

Not only plants but people too

Around 33 million people live in the Amazon, including some 400 indigenous peoples who have kept their ways of life intact. The peoples are divided into five groups: Brazilian indigenous peoples, Venezuelan indios, the Huitoto-Murui of northern Colombia, the Tupí-Guaraní of western and north-eastern Brazil, and the Jivaro of eastern Peru. Reforesting the Amazon would mean helping these peoples to continue living in a sustainable environment.

The solutions

In recent years, deforestation of the Amazon has become one of the main environmental concerns worldwide. The region is rapidly losing its rainforests, which are essential to maintaining the planet’s ecological and climatic balance.

According to some experts, stopping deforestation of the Amazon requires action on several fronts. Above all, the socio-economic conditions of local populations should be improved, so as to make them less dependent on the timber industry. In addition, it is necessary to increase surveillance of the territory and punish severely those who commit environmental crimes. Finally, investment should be made in reforesting the region, creating new protected areas and implementing programmes to support rainforest conservation.

In recent years several NGOs and international organisations have worked to achieve these results, but much more needs to be done in the interest of the whole planet.