The Amazon Rainforest : has it reached a point of no return ?

In our days, the Amazon Rainforest and its 390 billion trees is crucial to the stabilisation of our carbon impact, and therefore the sustaining of our planet. Without its impact, the earth would face severe issues due to greenhouse gases, air quality would massively deteriorate, and the impacts of climate change would be further amplified. Unfortunately, due to the increasing demand for agricultural land, cattle ranching, and forest fires the giant rainforest is losing its dimension at an alarming rate. In fact, in between August 2020 and July 2021, about 5 110 square miles of the rainforest’s area has been cut down, this area is roughly equal to 13 times the city of New York.

In estimation, above and below ground, the Amazon Rainforest is believed to contain over 123 billion tons of carbon, which is released into the atmosphere when the trees are cut or burned down, and as a result of deforestation, the Amazon emits more carbon dioxide that it can absorb, which already contributes to the global rates of greenhouse gases, but also worries scientists as the Amazon could be tipping towards a point of no return, meaning that the forest would be drying up, and become unable to absorb carbon dioxide, destroying an ecosystem that our planet relies on.

As reaching this point of no return would condemn the entirety of the Amazon Rainforest and cause problems on a global level, a lot of pressure has been placed on governments to fight against the acts of deforestation that are destroying this ecosystem, home to over 3 million species, which has already led to the Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro to sign a pledge to end deforestation, putting an end to his disregard concerning environmental regulations. Sadly, the reality of what continues to happen on the Brazilian territory does not reflect to the peaceful commitments the government has agreed to, and the problems continues to progress. There are a few ways that we can help as a global population : first of all, we can reduce our meat consumption, which would also reduce our carbon consumption, we can also buy our vegetables from locally sourced markets, which seems like a small action, but would greatly impact our planet. In conclusion, the solutions to this issue would either be to take great measures or small actions on a large scale. By simply taking small actions we can greatly impact our planet and maybe counteract the crisis that is going on right now.