Amazon deforestation up to make way for cattle and soy

THE rate of Amazon deforestation rose sharply during the last five months of 2007 as land was cleared for soy and cattle, prompting a top-level emergency meeting yesterday by government officials to deal with the problem.

Environment Minister Marina Silva and other ministers headed to the presidential palace yesterday morning to meet with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva after the report on deforestation was issued Wednesday.

Silva’s ministry said 1,287 square miles of rain forest were cleared from August through December, a big increase from the same period a year earlier.

Officials are still analysing the satellite imagery used to calculate the deforestation, and said the amount of jungle cut down and burned during the period could rise as high as 2,702 square miles, Brazil’s O Estado de S. Paulo newspaper reported.

Most of the destruction happened in November and December and was concentrated in the three Amazon states of Mato Grosso, Para and Rondonia.

Mato Grosso is the centre of Brazil’s important soy production industry, and Latin America’s largest nation is second only tothe United States for production.

Jungle is typically deforested in the Amazon to provide pasture for cattle, then soy farmers move in later and cultivate their crops on the cleared land.

Brazil last year trumpeted a drop in Amazon deforestation, but the new numbers appeared to indicate that the situation has been reversed.