- Title: Devastating fire just one of many challenges facing Amazon farmers
- Date: 29th August 2019
- Summary: RONDONIA, BRAZIL (AUGUST 28, 2019) (REUTERS) SECTION OF FOREST ON FIRE VIEW OF BURNING FOREST FROM FARM THAT IS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FIRE (SOUNDBITE) (Portuguese) FARMER WHO REQUESTED TO REMAIN UNIDENTIFIED, SAYING: "Education is precarious, there are no roads in proper condition in order to have access and during the rainy season, this area is completely isolated. If you have produce, it is difficult to distribute whatever it is that you managed to produce. If you have plantains or cassava, or if you managed to raise some pigs or a chicken you can't find a way to sell it because there's no way of leaving here. This is very isolated. School starts in May, it goes three times per week. For my son, for example, who attends a school that is close by and when it starts, the classes will end because the teacher will not be able to get here and the students won't have any way of getting there. So sometimes, all of these things, leads people to do what they are doing: they go and set fire and they work to try to set apart a parcel (of land) so they can plant something, sometimes having some kind of livestock is easier but it is very complicated, very difficult because we have no support, not from the municipality, not from the government. There is no support here, the people are pretty much abandoned. VIEW OF FLAMES FROM FARM IN THE FOREST AERIAL VIEWS OF PORTIONS OF FOREST LEFT CHARRED AFTER FIRE (MUTE) (SOUNDBITE) (Portuguese) FARMER WHO REQUESTED TO REMAIN UNIDENTIFIED, SAYING: "People were settled here under the premise that they would be able to harvest vegetables but I don't think that they ever walked through here to actually see it. There is no chestnut harvest. The famous chestnut harvest is barely available here. There is no straw for the brooms. These are very poor lands and the town was started by God's good grace and whoever is able to work the land will construct, will plant, will raise livestock, they will prepare the land. Regardless, we have no way to sell milk here because as I said earlier, when the rainy season begins and if you haven't prepared during the dry season, you will go hungry. It is impossible (to get out). The only ones who can get out are the ones who have a truck. The poor ones stay here, isolated." AERIAL VIEW OF DENSE FOREST NOT BURNED (MUTE) MILITARY TRUCK DRIVING ALONG DIRT ROAD RONDONIA, BRAZIL (AUGUST 25, 2019) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF REPRESENTATIVES FROM IBAMA SPEAKING WITH MILITARY OFFICIAL RONDONIA, BRAZIL (AUGUST 28, 2019) (REUTERS) GENERAL VIEW OF A SOCCER PITCH ON THE PROPERTY OF A CHURCH, SMOKE RISING FROM FOREST IN THE BACKGROUND GENERAL VIEW OF CRUCIFIX, SMALL CHURCH IN THE BACKGROUND, FOREST ON FIRE ECOLOGIST JOSE PRATZ WHO IS A MEMBER OF THE PASTORAL COMMISSION WHO WORK IN THE AREA STANDING NEXT TO PLANTAIN TREE (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) ECOLOGIST JOSE PRATZ WHO IS A MEMBER OF THE PASTORAL COMMISSION WHO WORK IN THE AREA SAYING: "(The deforestation) also comes with violence, sadly. We are here to accompany those small farmers. We have registered many killings, many detentions, as well as many expulsions of small farmers. Many times the state apparatus - police, judges, and the government - is against small farmers and in favour of the larger capital which many times, that larger capital is a foreign entity that comes here and takes over the land because they are interested in soy plantations, for the sale of wood, for the extraction of minerals. That also impacts the small communities and the small farmers." VARIOUS OF TRUCKS LOADED UP WITH LOGS THAT WERE TAKEN FROM THE FORESTS VARIOUS OF AERIALS OF VARIOUS LARGE PILES OF LOGS IN PATCH OF CLEARED IN RAIN FOREST (MUTE) TRUCK DRIVING PAST LOADED UP WITH LOGS
- Embargoed: 12th September 2019 19:26
- Keywords: Brazil wildfires environment Amazon farmers logging deforestation crisis
- Location: RONDONIA, BRAZIL
- City: RONDONIA, BRAZIL
- Country: Brazil
- Topics: Disaster/Accidents,Fires,Editors' Choice
- Reuters ID: LVA001AU9VAKN
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text:Wildfires raging in the Amazon rainforest have jumped this year, with 72,843 fires detected so far by Brazil's space research centre INPE, as concerns grow over right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro's environmental policy.
The surge marks an 83% increase over the same period of 2018, the agency said on Tuesday (August 27), and is the highest since 2010.
Since Thursday, INPE said satellite images spotted 9,507 new forest fires in the country, mostly in the Amazon basin, home to the world's largest tropical forest seen as vital to countering global warming.
In the state of Rondonia, one farmer who spoke on condition of anonymity painted a grim picture for small farmers trying to make a living year round. In an area already isolated, fires were not her only concern.
"If you have plantains or cassava, or if you managed to raise some pigs or a chicken you can't find a way to sell it because there's no way of leaving here. This is very isolated," she said on Wednesday (August 28) as flames could be seen in the background.
"So sometimes, all of these things, leads people to do what they are doing: they go and set fire and they work to try to set apart a parcel (of land) so they can plant something...but it is very complicated, very difficult because we have no support, not from the municipality, not from the government. There is no support here, the people are pretty much abandoned," she added.
The small farmer also said that many people like her were lead to settle there under the notion that they would have produce to sell. She said that in time, many realized it wasn't true.
"I don't think that they ever walked through here to actually see it. There is no chestnut harvest. The famous chestnut harvest is barely available here. There is no straw for the brooms. These are very poor lands and the town was started by God's good grace and whoever is able to work the land will construct, will plant, will raise livestock, they will prepare the land," she said.
"When the rainy season begins and if you haven't prepared during the dry season, you will go hungry. It is impossible (to get out). The only ones who can get out are the ones who have a truck. The poor ones stay here, isolated."
Bolsonaro's environmental policies have come under intense scrutiny in recent days as images of the burning Amazon have sparked international outrage and concern about the consequences for global warming.
Through July, destruction of Brazil's rainforest is up 67% compared to the same period a year ago, according to preliminary data released by the country's National Institute for Space Research (INPE). Nearly 80,000 fires have been recorded this year through Aug. 24, the highest level since at least 2013, INPE says.
A Reuters report on Wednesday found that Bolsonaro's government had weakened the federal agency charged with protecting the rain forest through budget cuts, restrictions on destroying equipment used in environmental crime, and the sidelining of an elite force of enforcement agents.
Brazil's federal government is preparing a presidential decree forbidding fires to clear land in the country during the dry season, the presidency said on Wednesday.
According to one source, Bolsonaro had already agreed to the main terms of the decree.
Environmentalists say Brazilian ranchers and farmers are intentionally igniting the jungle canopy to expand their operations illegally, emboldened by Bolsonaro's pro-development, anti-regulation message. Reuters was unable to confirm this claim.
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