Is the Destruction of the Amazon Rainforest a price Worth Paying for Brazil's Economic development?

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Is the Destruction of the Amazon Rainforest a price Worth Paying for Brazil’s Economic development?

The tropical rainforest is undoubtly one of the most fascinating biomes located around the world. These ecosystems are located over eighty five countries near the equator and one of the most prominent rainforest is known the Amazonia. The Amazon Rainforest not only situated over many countries including Brazil, , , , , , , , and  but it is also known to be home of over 50% of the Earth’s species and approximately one third of the world’s tree grows in Amazonia. The rainforest has been estimated to cover seven million square kilometres and at least forty thousand plant species have been classified, which makes the Amazon rainforest a resourceful bio diverse ecosystem. This biodiversity and large land has attracted potential companies, especially from Brazil to take advantage of the Amazon Rainforest. Although Brazil is one of the world’s fastest developing countries and the richest country in South America, it is still considered as a middle income ‘LEDC’ [Less Economically Developed Country] and its rapid population growth has increased the demand for natural resources. Brazil has remains to solve these problems by the deforestation of the precious Amazon Rainforest. Deforestation can be defined as the removal of the forest stands for human activities, such as agriculture and unfortunately, already 25% of the Amazon Rainforest has been cleared in 40 years and 40 hectares is being cleared per minute. At this rate, the Amazonia will be gone in 30 years! Is the destruction of the Amazon Rainforest a price worth paying for?

The Amazonia is famous for being the largest and more diverse ecosystem on Earth. Almost everyday, there are new species being discovered and the rainforest is the habitat to some of the most essential plants to the medical world, for example, the rosy periwinkle which is known to provide drugs to help cure leukaemia. The diverse ecosystem is caused indirectly by the location of the rainforest. The centre of the Amazon Rainforest is located near and on the equatorial line. This means that the Amazonia receives concentrated amount of sun rays, making the rainforest very hot. The equatorial location means that the temperature of the climate is very high and constant with twelve hours of sunshine. Usually, the morning temperature can reach up to 32°C and in the evening, it rarely goes below 22°C. The high concentration of the sun rays absorbed by the Earth also encourages conventional rainfall daily. This is when the land gets real hot, that the warm air around it gets enough energy to rise. As the warm air rises, it gets cooled by the atmosphere because it is much colder the higher you travel. The cooled air then condenses into clouds and later heavy rainfalls. Due to daily conventional rainfalls, the Amazon rainforest is a wet, humid area as well as being hot. The Amazon rainforest has two seasons: the dry season between June to December and wet season from January to May, when May can have a rainfall of around 259 mm.  The abiotic factors, the non living features of earth like the sun, cause the Amazon Rainforest to have a very warm and humid climate, also known as a tropical climate.

The biotic factors, the living factors of an ecosystem like plants, are just as important as the climate in maintaining the tropical rainforest. The diagrams on the next page show how vital plant life is to support the other plants in the ecosystem. After a plant dies or leaves fall to the forest floor, decomposers in the soil break down the dead matter into humus. Humus is important to forest land chemically and physically. Humus can increase the amount of moisture a soil holds and can help the soil have a better structure. Humus also acts as a catalyst because it has actives sites that help produce nutrients. The more nutrients a soil has, the better a plant would be able to grow and survive. This also shows why deforestation endangers the ecosystem. The second cycle illustrates shows that when trees are cleared away, causing less leaves and dead organisms to decay onto the soil, less humus is produced. This cause there to be fewer nutrients because more was taken away from the plant than returned back to the soil as the tree was removed. Fewer nutrients means that the soil is less fertile than originally, so new plants grow with a weaker quality and less chance of surviving. This encourages soil erosion because there no trees to protect the soil from being moved away.

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Brazil has the eighth largest economy in world and is the wealthiest in its continent. Unfortunately, the country can only be considered as a NIC [newly developed country] or LEDC and is still located under the Brandt line. The Brandt line is a ‘socio-economic’ line that divides the more economically developed countries, the north, from the less economically developed countries, the south. This is understandable because the social and economics indicators are considerably low, especially compared to the UK.

Figure 2: This table shows the measure of development in the year 2000.

Figure 2 expands on Brazil ...

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