Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest has fallen by a third since President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office in January. In Brazil’s Amazon region, 2,649 square kilometers of forest were destroyed from January to June, according to satellite images from the National Institute for Space Research, the government said on Thursday. In the same period of the previous year, 3988 square meters of forest had been destroyed.
“We have achieved a steady downward trend in deforestation in the Amazon,” Environment Minister Marina Silva told reporters. In June, the decrease of 41 percent compared to the same month last year was particularly clear. Silva said this was due to Lula’s policies to combat climate change and rainforest destruction.
Lula wants to stop the destruction of the environment
Left-wing Lula took office in January promising to end the rampant environmental destruction under his right-wing predecessor Jair Bolsonaro. Under Bolsonaro, deforestation in the Amazon rainforest has increased by 75 percent between 2019 and 2022 compared to the previous decade.
Lula presented a comprehensive protection plan for the Amazon in June. It provides, among other things, for the immediate confiscation of half of all illegally used land within protected areas and the designation of three million hectares of new protected areas by 2027.
‘The government finally takes action again’
Environmentalists applaud the development. “The government is back in action, enforcing the law and protecting the unique treasure of the Amazon,” said the head of the organization Observatório do Clima, Marcio Astrini. “That causes deforestation rates to drop.”
The Amazon rainforest stretches across nine countries, mostly in Brazil. It is one of the few remaining large old-growth forests in the world and is home to more plant and animal species than anywhere else on Earth. Moreover, with its billions of trees, it is an important carbon sink.
Source: Krone
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