According to the Brazilian space agency INPE, a total of 222,798 events occurred in Brazil in 2020.
The Amazon and the Pantanal are two of the most valuable ecosystems on Earth.
Let us remind you that the Pantanal is a vast wetlandtectonic basin in Brazil, small parts of it are also located in Bolivia and Paraguay, in the Paraguay River basin. The Southern Pantanal is an area of incredible biodiversity. But nearly a quarter of Brazil's Pantanal was devastated by fires last year amid the region's worst drought in nearly half a century.
The Amazon, the area with the largest rainforest in the world, is considered vital in curbing climate change due to the carbon dioxide that the region's trees absorb from the atmosphere.
The problem is that about 60 percenttropical forest is located in Brazil. President Bolsonaro's government distinguished itself this year by rolling back all mangrove protections. The ruling is part of a series of controversial environmental decisions by the far-right president, who has presided over deforestation in the Amazon rainforest and Pantanal wetlands since taking office. took office in January 2019.
Images of charred landscapes strewn withanimal carcasses shook the world, prompting criticism of the Bolsonaro government for failing to stop the destruction. Bolsonaro, a far-right climate change skeptic, is also under attack for the sharp increase in deforestation in the Amazon during his reign.
Activists say his drive to openthe Amazon's protected lands for agribusiness and mining, and its government's cuts in funding for environmental protection programs, are contributing to destruction.
According to the space monitoring programAccording to PRODES, deforestation destroyed an area of the Brazilian Amazon larger than Jamaica in the year to August—the highest rate in 12 years. Experts believe fires in the Amazon are largely being driven by people clearing land for farming and ranching and are hoping the new findings will spark a public outcry.
Previously, the number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon has already grown by 48.7% in 2019, the first year of Bolsonaro's rule, which caused outrage around the world.
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