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Rainforest Razed so Cattle Can Graze
Brazil's attempt to double its share of the global market for beef will carry a heavy environmental cost, report warns
Green activists say that country's determination to double its share of the world beef market is likely to undermine its new targets for halting Amazon rainforest destruction and reducing carbon emissions.
Smoke from man made forest fires which clear land for cattle to roam and graze (Daniel Beltr/Greenpeace) The South American country has the world's largest cattle herd and is already the biggest beef exporter on the planet. Now the Brazilian government is seeking to boost its share of the world beef market from 30 per cent to 60 per cent in the next decade.
Most of this growth will come in Amazonia, on pastureland created by cutting down rainforest, according to a report released today by Greenpeace. The cattle industry will be the main driver of deforestation, it argues.
And deforestation will mean, the environment group says, that Brazil will not be able to curb its massive carbon dioxide emissions - 75 per cent of them coming from deforestation. It is already the planet's fourth-biggest greenhouse gas emitter after China, the United States and Indonesia. This is despite the fact that in December last year the Brazilian government introduced targets for reducing deforestation by 72 per cent by 2017, as a part of a national climate-change action plan.
Although it has long been known that cattle ranching, which has been expanding continuously since the early 1970s, has been a principaldriver of rainforest destruction in Brazil, the Greenpeace study, entitled "Amazon Cattle Footprint", is thought to be the first detailed assessment of the scale of its impact.
The report uses innovative satellite-mapping techniques to expose direct links between new cattle farms and forest destruction in one of the largest Amazon states, Mato Grosso. One map, for example, reveals the location of industrial-sized slaughterhouses within the state, and shows how they have become the epicentres of major forest destruction as land is cleared to make way for pasture.
Between 1996 and 2006, the report says, the area of pastures in the Amazon grew by approximately 10 million hectares - an area the size of Portugal - to accommodate a vast expansion of the Brazilian cattle herd, which now numbers about 65 million animals.
Between 2002 and 2006, 14.5 million of the total of 20.5 million animals added to the herd were in the Amazon, which now holds about 40 per cent of the national herd, the report says.
It adds that according to Brazilian government data, in 2006 there were three head of cattle in the Amazon for every human inhabitant. Just under 80 per cent of the deforested Amazon is now used for cattle grazing.
"The Brazilian government needs to get a grip on the cattle industry before it completely undermines the country's chances of tackling climate change," said Sarah Shoraka, Greenpeace's forests campaigner. "Right now, huge swathes of rainforest are being cut down to feed the global appetite for beef and leather. As these new maps show, there's a clear link between the location of new cattle ranches and the destruction of the Amazon rainforest.
"Stopping this expansion offers the best chance of fighting climate change in Brazil, but we need the government to step in before it's too late."
The Amazon basin holds the largest tropical forest in the world, and is the most diverse ecosystem on Earth, playing a vital role in ensuring the region's water supplies, regulating rainfall, and keeping the world'sclimate in balance.
Continued cattle expansion will also have devastating impacts on the Amazon's unique ecosystem and could displace millions of indigenous people, the Greenpeace report says.
In 2006 another major driver of deforestation, soya bean cultivation, has been partly curbed: after pressure from environmentalists, soya growers agreed to a moratorium on growing on newly deforested land. It is likely that the Brazilian cattle industry will now come under similar pressure.
Luis Felipe Carvalho, the secondsecretary at the Brazilian embassy in London, said last night that Brazil did not believe that doubling cattle production would undermine its target to reduce deforestation. It was hoped to use intensive farming techniques to produce more cattle in future from a smaller area of land. "Doubling the cattle industry does not necessarily mean doubling the land the cattle industry uses. We hope to increase productivity, not just the size of the area farmed," he said.
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28 Comments so far
Show AllWhat will happen when the world's only herd of cows gets sick and people stop eating infected beef?
I guess we all become vegetarians. Quo vadis Brazil?
This is just one reason I gave up eating beef a long time ago.
I find it funny that people don't blame the people nearly as much as they blame the beef.
People are obviously the problem(when are they not?) but in this case its pretty obvious the only solution is to reduce cattle numbers, not increase them.
You cant move them to tiny crags on hilltops.
This article doesnt even mention that the soya is grown to feed European livestock. Or water use.
The sin of a meat based diet spreads far and wide.
Going vegetarian is the only sensible choice.
Promoting meat is like saying Israel is the victim of its Gazan prisoners. It turns the world and logic upside down.
There is simply no rational argument for a meat based diet except that you dont give a damn what happens to life in general.
At least the new meat eaters in China and India will cut their populations through meat related illnesses.
You can't be a meat eater and an environmentalist.
Thank you for saying this. I was planning on doing so, but you beat me to the punch. Amen.
There are two separate United Nations studies that have stated unequivocally that the number one thing humans can do to help the environment and stave off its destruction is to stop eating meat and dairy products. The animal-as-food based industry is one of the top two destroyers of the environment.
I don't have the exact links to the studies, but they have been cited in numerous books and websites.
Our planet can not sustain the current reproduction rates--and this is an essential factor in warming and related environmental issues as well as hunger. The Bush administration had waged war against family planning and the environment since his first day in office, when he essentially halted our international aid to these essential programs.
Bush’s contribution to over population, as well as his other enviromental crimes, have already caused immeasurable suffering & environmental damage to our planet. Until effective family planning programs can proceed without blockages from such irrational zealots guided by religious right radicals, starvation and environmental degradation from overpopulation can only worsen.
If our new president fails to reverse the dreadful Bush policies, he must assume blame for their catastraphic results.
t_g
And how do you suggest we go about reducing the population? Are you prepared to take on religions? Pick any one of them: all the christian ones, the Jewish, the Moslem, etc. etc. They are all fervently against birth control and don't even mention abortion or they'll burn you at the stake!
Or how about the IVF industry? Look at the latest instalment: the octuplets in California.
Yes, I do agree with you, even went so far as only to have one child (and even though he is in his late 30s, no grandchild yet).
Regarding the environmental crimes: yes, they are immense. I live in Australia and our previous ultra right-wing, pro-Bush in every way (our SAS was first in Iraq and of course all-the-way-to-the-Hindu-Kush-with-Georgie-Bush), anyway, they were climate change denyers until right up until they were thrown out of power in late 2007. We didn't even protect our Great Barrier Reef (5% only). And our pastoralists are destroying any leftover bush without any punishment even today. If you know anything about Oz, the most important is to know that we are the dryest continent on Earth. We can't farm this land like in Europe!
We have a huge cattle and sheep industry. And even though our bush is by far not so spectacular as the Amazonian rainforest, it is just as important for our wellbeing.
Yes, I believe that vegetarianism is the answer. The sooner, the better we all convert
Not only does deforestation dangerously increase greenhouse gases, but it destroys ecosystems, leading to a disappearance of ancient cultures along with their wisdom. And, gives more impetus to the exponentially rising rate of plant and animal extinctions. The extinctions are not only crimes against the plants and animals in themselves, will be deeply harmful for the future of the human race.
For one thing, yes, stop eating cows.
If the countries of the world would give this problem the thought and planning that its seriousness requires, perhaps they would come up with the idea the U.S. has put into practice for so many years: pay the Amazonian ranchers and farmers NOT to grow beef, palm trees, and other living things that diminish the rainforests' natural functions.
Paul Siemering
Native Americans knew the earth was here for everyone to share. when europeans offered to buy the land they were puzzled "how can you buy and sell Mother Earth?" they asked. this question has never been answered. to capitalists everything is a commodity, everything is for sale. that does not mean they are engaged in rational thought.
anyway. when the world first noticed the disasters that were happening in Amazonia, many people tried to make the claim tht Brazil does not really "own" the rainforest. it is not theirs to do with as they wish. our argument then was that the rainforest is part of a global ecosystem in which it is an absolutely essential part.
the plan to double beef production is insane. we need to reduce beef pruduction until it reaches zero
There is another piece to this argument- a conclusive one i believe. even if one were to concede a country can "own" a rainforest, who then "owns" the people who live there? Does Brazil believe that the good people who live in the rainforest come with the property? Such a claim is preposterous, and also violates our laws against slavery.If the forest belongs to anyone, then it must certainly be the people who live in it and have been faithful stewards for millennia before the europeans came.
P.S. -"how can you buy and sell Mother Earth?" they asked. this question has never been answered. to capitalists everything is a commodity, everything is for sale. that does not mean they are engaged in rational thought.
Are you implying capitalists are the only ones who own property? What are your thoughts on property? This isn't an attack, but a question to apprehend your statement.
This is more evidence that the insane production of animals for consumption creates nothing but misery for the animals, the land and the people who live on the land.
If Vegas was offering bets on your saving the earth this old Indian would bet against you. When I post at Native sites where the people have a great sorrow in their heart about the destruction of the earth I can only tell them the truth that this world is pretty much owned & operated by the money money money men & women & they have no intention of slowing down.
As soon as human beings invented money in the Cause & Effect of time compression you have this world as it is now & everyone is enslaved by money execept for a few remote tribes that haven't been swallowed up or completely swallowed up by the cash register world.
When the land belonged to the tribes the animals pretty much ran free. Doesn't have anything to do with eating or not eating meat it has to do with the way you live upon the earth & as all people are forced to lived upon the earth.
Mathematics conclude that if there are this many problems with the world & enviroment now they will just get worse as time goes on & begin to grow greater as they multiply.
Most of you are just living in fear over problems your never going to solve. The prophecies of many people's including the Native tribes speak of the destruction of the earth. In the Book of Revelation God states he is the destroyer of those who pollute the earth.
Creator/God has known all along what the human race is going to do upon the earth. He knows the hearts of the greedy as in Chapter 18 it is stated the merchants of the earth were great men who deceived all the Nations of the Earth with their Sorceries.
As the Book of Revelation talks about the Buyers & Sellers of things but not in any good light at all.
The prophecies of most people talk far more about the peoples of the earth being destroyed by modern day weapons & natural disasters as the Hopi prophecies foretell this land pretty much being burned off the face of the earth by man made fire that they consider are them big modern day firecrackers invented in the 40's.
It is very difficult to un-destroy the earth once a globalist earth destroying system is in place & the human race earns their living through the sum total of that earth destroying system.
The Native tribes lived with the bounty of what Creator/God provided for them then the money money money people that became Banks & Corporations replaced God as provider setting up their worldly system of slavery upon the earth that Jesus will do away with all in God's own good time.
ShadowDancer,
As melancholy as it is . . . excellent post. Very heartfelt.
It was only a couple weeks of go that I came to realize the true message Jesus brought to us. It has nothing to do with accepting the 'lord' as your saviour, but his message was a message of love. A lot of people throw in claims what he said and the Bible can say what it wants, but really he taught us to love ourself and to love our neighbors. That is all.
If your God is so powerful, why doesn't he put a stop to it now?
And the Earth isn't going to be destroyed- Humans are. Once humans wipe themselves from the planet, Earth will take about 1 million years to recover fully. Really nothing considering the planet is 3.5 billion years old.
I don't feel sorry for the planet or nature- I feel sorry for the human race
There was a posting by a Brazilian observing the journey of 150 indigenous representatives to the World Social Forum. They had navigated down the Amazon river to Belém over four days, having meetings and stopping at various cities. When they arrived the afternoon winter rains, like clockwork, came in with wind, torrential.
Disembarking from the boat, in full regalia, tens of thousands of people were there to meet them and the march to the WSF site had begun. In a long line they walked and sang and the crowd opened and made way for them. Within the crowd the serpentine line from the depths of the forest - people coming to say enough, stop, join us to stop the damming of the rivers, the murder of the millions of animals, the coralling and killing of indigenous, the pollution.
Umbrella venders, with "the product of the moment' made no sales. The indigenous peoples, arriving with the rain, all were drenched in the cycle of the creator, invigorated, hearing each other in gesture and song.
Justice for the Amazon is the topic of the final assembly in the Tent of Peoples of the Forest as the forum concludes today.
Todays schedule:
ASSEMBLIES ON THE FINAL DAY OF THE WSF 2009 (01/02)
From 9am-12am
Assemblies according to specific themes
- UFRA Territory -
Together for Climate Justice in Copenhagen - Tenda Multiuso 2
Assembly on human rights - Tenda Direitos Humanos
Assembly on the Collective Rights of Peoples - Tenda dos Povos sem Estado
Assembly "Crisis in Civilization, Living Well and Collective Rights" - Tenda Indigena
General assembly against war, military bases, militarism and nuclear weapons - Tenda Multiuso 1
Pan-Amazonian Assembly -Tenda Pan Amazônia
Facing the crise, developing the Social Forum as a permanent process from the propositions - Salão Verde
Assembly Sciences and Democracy - Auditório da Prefeitura
Assembly on Negros in the 2009 WSF - Tenda Afro-negritude
Assembly on Women - Tenda Multiuso 4
For a World Without Debt: Audit and Reparations Now - Tenda Multiuso 3
Network of inter-communication and good experiences - Predio central - Sala de Desenho
Towards Globalising the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples - Predio central - Anfiteatro
World assembly of the united international network of human rights - Tenda Reforma Urbana
Struggle against corruption and impunity - Predio Central - COO2
Justice for the Amazon - Tenda dos Povos da Floresta
- UFPA Territory -
World Forum of Education - Tenda Cuba 50 anos
For alternatives to security-based migration policies - Auditório do CAPACIT
For a global response to the financial crisis - Auditório do ICJ
Culture and education for transformation - Tribunal do Juri
Alternatives for the protection of the Amazonian ecosystems - Auditório de Reitoria
Labour in the global crisis - Tenda Mundo do Trabalho
2.30PM - Assembly of the Assemblies - Local: Main stage in the UFRA
you veggies are regurgitating the crap that socialists have been promoting for years. stop eating meat, means more for the RICH. think of how screwed you would be if all your crops failed...guess yer going hunting....please recognise in our sociaty of convenience you CAN be vegitarian....but its because of CONVENIENCE. quit trying to disrespect others right to eat as they choose.
This article didn't even mention the fact that livestock produces more greenhouse gases, mostly in the form of methane, than all forms of transportation combined! Meat consumption on the scale of the first world is unsustainable, greedy, and unhealthy.
AND that methane is seven times more destructive to the ozone than the carbon dioxide that comes from our modes of transportation.
If all of the crops died, so would all of the animal kingdom, including you and me.
What do you think cows, pigs and chicken eat?
I am not a complete vegetarian, but have cut way back on meat because it is destructive to the environment. The destruction of rainforest at a time when carbon uptake is direly needed and biodiversity is diminishing is harmful to all life including humans.
ShadowDancer says: "It is very difficult to un-destroy the earth once a globalist earth destroying system is in place ..." He (or she) is right. And there is no single way to remedy the damage. Still what choice do we have but to keep trying in all kinds of ways, large and small, to let the earth, oceans, streams and air rebound?
Joe
"please recognise in our sociaty of convenience you CAN be vegitarian....but its because of CONVENIENCE."
What exactly do you mean by this statement?
If Brazil wants to produce 60% of the world's beef, most of it will be for export. The consumers must share the blame for this problem.
If Brazil can save Mc Donals ten cents per pound, that spells out millions of dollars in profit - in a global recession.
I'm sure the Walmart Supercenters and Sams would jump at this kind of savings. I would not be surprised to learn that they are financing this growth.
We also must deal with out own reality. The beef industry in the US is a global embarrassment. We have genetically modified maize (corn) out of existence. We now face a massive epidemic of chronic diseases, such as diabetes, which can be traced to genetically modified crops. Beef has destroyed out land, has destroyed out health and threatens the very existence of the biodiversity we will need to survice as a species.
Maybe we should accept that the beef industry is bigger than us. That agribusiness is bigger than us. That we can't solve the problems of the world until we put our house in order.
I hope I'm wrong ... please reassure me
Man - and more "advanced" the so-called "white man" - is, it seems, the voracious virus to the planet, as is, f. ex., the HIV to the human body. Anything to apparently senselessly eat, kill, destroy!
Could it be our Darwinist evolutional function? We came, we spent some time, we ... did WHAT, after all? Ate and farted, ate what farted ... our brains out.
No other creature is known to have come, spent time, and done so little.
But "Pyramids", and "space travel", we gloat.
Clearly ephemerally useless.
'Yes we can' revert the destruction, as it is happening in slow motion?
Slow when one doesn't consider the eons of time WITHOUT man. In such light we are in fact extremely quick, since we're destroying in 'minutes', what eons took eternities to build.
Even as man's end seems only 'seconds' away, the hordes that are us march on busily gasing ... ourselves!
I'm sure the Universe has lots in store for this little crumb called Earth. Let's hope it'll never again create 'white man'!
I smell the sight of weeping trees. I see the sound of mankind's stench.
I feel so totally, abysmally alone.
woah, your a little racist there.
Whenever a population becomes to large for an ecosystem to handle- there is a massive die off. That's what will happen to mankind. And Mankind isn't the first organism to experience this either. Many will die once we push the planet beyond it's limits, but some will survive with lessons learned.
Don't be so pessimisstic. It's just nature
"Luis Felipe Carvalho, the secondsecretary at the Brazilian embassy in London, said last night that Brazil did not believe that doubling cattle production would undermine its target to reduce deforestation. It was hoped to use intensive farming techniques to produce more cattle in future from a smaller area of land. 'Doubling the cattle industry does not necessarily mean doubling the land the cattle industry uses. We hope to increase productivity, not just the size of the area farmed,' he said"
yah right, lets fix the problem by torturing cattle more!