We need a bit of levity to take the edge off the disturbing climate news that has finally begun to get some attention from the media after seven decades of ignoring the blinking code-red lights. It would have been nice if they reported the news instead of waiting until the shit hit the proverbial fan. But, hey, it's better late than never, I suppose.
The video's release was during the run-up to the presidential election when genocidal maniac Bolsonaro fled the country to Mar-a-Lago after losing the election big time and shared notes on how to overthrow the newly elected legitimate government.
Monga Bay recently shared a story on how Brazil's new agricultural frontier known as Matopibe is already changing from climate change due to the destruction of the crucial carbon sinks of the Cerrado and the rainforest from logging, agriculture, fires, and mining.
In the transition zone between the eastern Amazon and the Cerrado, an interaction between climate change and agricultural expansion may be resulting in increased temperature and reduced rainfall. This is one of the main conclusions of a study conducted by Brazilian and foreign researchers.
This transition zone, known as Matopiba since it encompasses parts of the states of Maranhão, Tocantins, Piauí and Bahia, is the largest area of contact between forest and savanna in the tropics. The Cerrado predominates in 91% of the region, while the remaining 9% is composed of patches of Amazon Rainforest and Caatinga vegetation. In the last 20 years, this area has become an important agricultural frontier for Brazil.
According to the general coordinator of the research, José Marengo, from the National Center for Monitoring and Early Warning of Natural Disasters (CEMADEN) and first author of the study, the objective of the work was to evaluate if what is occurring in the eastern Amazon happens in the Matopiba region. “And, in fact, we observed that it does. In the region where the new agricultural frontier is being implemented, similar changes are happening to what is observed in the eastern Amazon,” he says.
The damage is not a future scenario of collapse but is happening today.
The team also found that the largest warming and drought trends in tropical South America during the last four decades were observed precisely in this transition region between Amazonia and the Cerrado. “The replacement of natural vegetation cover by areas destined for agriculture and livestock, together with climate change, may have contributed to the intensification of drought events in that area, especially in the zone known as Matopiba,” says Cunha.
According to her, the results of the work show an increase in the frequency of days without rain and a decrease in the volume of precipitation, besides a delay in the beginning of the rainy season, inducing a greater risk of forest fires during the transition from the dry to the humid period. “These findings provide evidence of increasing climate pressure in this area, which may put global food security at risk, and of the need to reconcile agricultural expansion and the protection of natural tropical biomes,” she says.
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“Matopiba has emerged and partially consolidated as a Brazilian government-backed program for the expansion of agribusiness,” says Marengo. “This represents a move away from Amazon policies in response to strong opposition to deforestation in the region,” he adds.
The study predicts, however, that the processes of environmental change driven by socioeconomic growth in the Matopiba region will in turn be greatly affected by climate change. The gradual increase in annual temperature and water deficit will lead to a longer and hotter dry season with a high frequency of very hot days. “Since soybean productivity is affected by rainfall deficits, the drought trend can reduce the crop’s productivity, putting food security and the Brazilian economy at risk,” Marengo warns.
The Amazon rainforest has transitioned from a crucial carbon sink to a carbon source. The transition to growing food in the rainforest was a fool's errand now that deforestation has resulted from a climate that will not have the agricultural boom security Brazil's money interests had in mind.