Here’s Where the Amazon Is Burning and Why It’s Going to Get Worse

Illegal farming has long eaten away at the edges of protected regions within the state of Pará. Farmers who illegally raze the forest often are not prosecuted, and a law passed in July makes it easier for them to claim legal ownership of land developed unlawfully. Bolsonaro, who was elected with massive support from rural areas, has claimed that environmental groups and regulators are an “industry of fines,” and a New York Times investigation found that his administration has not enforced laws on the books intended to preserve the Amazon.

Deforestation within protected areas

◼ TREE COVER, 2000

◼ TREE LOSS, 2000–18

◼ GLAD TREE LOSS ALERTS, 2019

INDIGENOUS AREA

NATIONAL

PARK

◼ TREE COVER, 2000

◼ TREE LOSS, 2000–18

◼ GLAD TREE LOSS ALERTS, 2019

INDIGENOUS AREA

NATIONAL

PARK

◼ TREE COVER, 2000

◼ TREE LOSS, 2000–18

◼ GLAD TREE LOSS

ALERTS, 2019

INDIGENOUS

AREA

NATIONAL

PARK

Commodities are key drivers behind the increased pace of deforestation. An analysis of tree loss from 2001 to 2015 shows that most of the Amazon was lost to commodity-driven deforestation—or “long-term, permanent conversion of forest and shrubland to a non-forest land use such as agriculture, mining or energy infrastructure.”

Brazilian soy exports have increased more than fourfold since 2000—driven almost entirely by demand from China. Ongoing trade disputes with the U.S. have only increased demand in China: Soy shipments from Brazil increased 27% from 2017 to 2018, boosting domestic prices. Beef exports have surged as well. And as the African swine fever outbreak has decimated pork production in China, their demand for Brazilian beef is expected to increase.

Growing markets for Brazilian soy and beef meant producers needed more land. To meet demand, pastureland in central and southern parts of the country was replaced with soybeans, forcing ranchers to head north, clearing forests for cattle.

Brazilian soy and meat exports, 2002–2018

Soy

Meat

Metric tons:

8M

Metric tons:

6

CHINA

HK

4

OTHER

2

CHINA

OTHER

0

Soy

Beef

Metric tons:

Metric tons:

100M

8M

80

6

CHINA

HK

60

4

40

2

OTHER

CHINA

20

OTHER

0

0

2002

2018

2002

2018

Metric tons

Soy

80M

60

40

CHINA

20

0

OTHER

2002

2018

Metric tons

Meat

6M

HK

CHINA

4

2

OTHER

0

2002

2018

A decade ago, three of the largest meat-packing suppliers in Brazil—JBS, Marfrig and Minerva—signed an agreement with Greenpeace to no longer source from farmers involved in deforestation. But the environmental organization discontinued the program after a bribery scandal engulfed beef companies in Brazil in 2017. Large companies must deal with local suppliers, who then source from many small farmers—and short of tracking individual cattle, the chain is nearly impossible to verify.

The soybean industry has used satellite images to monitor deforestation and the conversion of forests into soy farms since 2006, when the country’s soy-processor group Abiove created a so-called “soy moratorium.” Cargill Inc., Bunge Ltd., Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. and Louis Dreyfus Co. are among the companies that have committed to not purchasing soybeans from newly deforested land in the Amazon.

Still, since the start of the moratorium, soybean acreage in the Amazon is up more than fourfold, representing 13% of Brazil's total soybean area in the 2017-18 season—though only 1.4% of the plantings happened in newly deforested areas. That’s largely because the oilseed is mostly grown in areas that had already been cleared for pastures.

As international pressure over the Amazon fires has grown—with some countries considering bans on Brazilian exports—Bolsonaro acknowledged the increase in deforestation during a Aug. 22 live stream on social media, but said some countries are taking the moment “to undermine our agribusiness, our economy and repress Brazil to a subordinate position.”

“We have to respond to the world, show that we are responsible and say that the Amazon is ours.”