This Week in Human Rights News

Increasing Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon

Sources: Al Jazeera, Mongabay, Reuters 

• Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon rose 50 percent in October, ending a three-month streak of declining deforestation rates, according to data released Friday by the government space research institute, INPE.

• The news came days after Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro appeared to threaten the use of military force against the United States if it attempted to impose sanctions on Brazil for its failure to slow rising deforestation.

• Bolsonaro has presided over a sharp increase in deforestation since he took office in January 2019.

• Destruction in 2020 continues to be far higher than in the years before Bolsonaro assumed office. 

• Bolsonaro has weakened environmental enforcement and called for more farming and mining in the Amazon to lift the region out of poverty, which environmental advocates say is emboldening Brazilians to cut down the forest.

• Monthly deforestation eased from its peak from July to September as the rainy season began, making logging difficult.

• INPE’s satellite-based deforestation alert system shows that 836 square kilometers of Amazon forest — an area equal to 246 times the size of New York City’s Central Park — was cut down during October 2020. 

• Brazil is expected to release its official measure of 2020 deforestation by year’s end, which is usually far higher than the preliminary figures. 

• That measure, called PRODES, compares satellite images at the end of July 2020 to those taken at the beginning of August 2019 to detect forest clearances.

• Researchers at the non-government Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM) say that PRODES is predicted to show a dramatic increase to more than 14,000 square kilometres (5,405 square miles) deforested for 2020 compared with 10,129 square kilometres (3,911 square miles) for 2019. 

• That would likely be the highest deforestation since 2006.