Julie Writes About The Amazon Rainforest and Our Responsibility to help Sustain All Life on our Planet
Your Carbon Footprint Makes a Difference
Research by United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees claims that 20 to 25 million people per year are displaced in the world due to climate related disasters. All of us are in danger of this displacement. The greener we make this world, the greater possibility we won’t see climate disasters escalate. Small moves by many make a big difference. Here are a few easy and economical choices you can make to lessen your personal carbon footprint:
Traveling a lot by car and plane? Offset your carbon footprint by contributing to organizations that plant trees.
Love the convenience of takeout food? Reuse the plastic you already have for takeout food wherever they will allow it, and bring your own containers for leftovers at restaurants.
Do you buy a lot of health products, such as shampoo, toothpaste and hand soap packaged in plastic? Find a store such as as Fillgood.co. and fill glass containers with healthy products for your personal use. Refill your glass containers every month or two as needed.
Forming Alliances with Indigenous Populations Despite being frontline defenders of nature, indigenous populations all over the world continually face threats to their land, food systems and cultural survival. They need our help in forming alliances because illegal activity and encroachment of their land threatens their survival. Climate change threatens all humanity. We can benefit from indigenous wisdom that connects to land, water and all the diversity around us. Pachamama Alliance and Bioneers are two local organizations that share many sustainability solutions and indigenous wisdom with us through their insightful programs, seminars, workshops and conferences.
The Amazon Rainforest (Amazonia)
The Largest Rainforest on Earth Amazonia covers most of Brazil and many neighboring countries in South America and spans more than 2 million square miles. Its rainfall feeds the Amazon River and over 1000 tributaries. The Amazon river carries more water than the next 6 largest rivers combined and discharges about 20% of all freshwater entering the oceans from rivers worldwide.
Controlling Weather Patterns In Amazonia Plants perspire and transpire water into the air, forming a continual large atmospheric river of water above the forest which affects climate regulation in Amazonia, the United States and Canada. During peak rainy seasons, this flying river sweats about 20 billion tons of water daily into the sky, feeding the land and the land’s runoff—including from the Andes—and feeds the Amazon River, which enters the Atlantic.
Home of Millions of Species Amazonia contains more biodiversity than any other terrestrial ecosystem on earth. It is home to more than four hundred mammals, five hundred reptiles, four thousand species of plants, thousands of bird species, and millions of different insects and fish. There are still so many more species yet to be discovered.
Threats to Amazonia’s Unique Water Cycle
Illegal and harmful human activity poisons the air, water, land and inhabitants and causes drought. Rainfall changes due to deforestation can alter wind patterns and storm development in the Atlantic that reach as far as North America and Canada.
Logging Tree removal reduces evapotranspiration (water released into the air by plants). Less moisture in the air means fewer clouds and less rain, leading to longer, hotter dry seasons.
Non-Regenerative Cattle Ranching Converting rainforest into cattle pasture, soy fields, or infrastructure disrupts the local water cycle. These changes reduce cloud formation and rainfall, deepening dry season impacts.
Threats to Land, Water and Inhabitants
Amazonia is the most biodiverse area in the world, and we haven’t even discovered every species that lives there. A delicately balanced ecosystem, Amazonia, cannot thrive under the following practices.
Monocropping Farmers and ranchers often use slash-and-burn techniques to clear land. Producing only one crop year after year not only depletes the soil, chemicals used in this kind of farming trickle into waters and poison inhabitants.
Fracking Roads, pipelines and drilling pads necessitate deforestation and can trigger earthquakes in this fragile environment. Millions of gallons of water mixed with toxic chemicals release greenhouse gases methane and benzene which harm air quality. Fluid spills damage soil and rivers. Displacing indigenous communities for drilling causes them to give up their lifestyle and the poisonous environment causes skin problems, cancer, respiratory diseases and birth defects. Resistance to these illegal offenders who are violating land rights can cause much violence so laws need to be properly enforced.
Gold Mining For gold mining, vast tracks of land need to be burned, causing huge amounts of carbon dioxide release. Illegal miners use mercury and other toxic chemicals to extract gold. These poisons leak into the waterways, killing aquatic life, adversely affecting the food chain. Using exploitative labor practices such as human trafficking and child labor, many unsanctioned gold miners have a negative impact on inhabitants, as mercury leakage can cause serious health problems.
Positive Actions to Protect Amazonia
Bio Regional Plan to Stabilize Global Climate Pachamama Alliance, a Bay Area non-profit organization, along with indigenous peoples of Peru and Ecuador, developed this plan in order to stabilize the global climate by regulating water in the Amazon Rainforest. This humid forest creates about half of its rainfall through evapotranspiration (moisture released by trees and plants in the humid climate). The moisture rises into the atmosphere, forms clouds, and falls as rain – feeding rivers, forests and farms. These organizations , including Bioneers and many other non-profits are working hard to keep this pumping heart of water strong so it can keep regulating weather conditions in Amazonia and beyond.
Enforcing Anti-Logging and Burning Laws Forced burning often doesn’t take into account that one tree burned will kill 20 more as they are all connected underground by mycilium (fungal networks) that hold them up. Indigenous peoples are becoming more and more powerful in governing their own land, and yet they need more help to stop these illegal activities.
Encouraging Agroforestry A land use management system, this type of planning integrates agriculture and forestry for mutual benefit. Combining trees, shrubs, and other perennial plants with crops and/or livestock creates positive ecological and economical outcomes.
Forests and Farming in Amazonia
Creating Protected Forest Areas Vast stretches of untouched land can massively reduce carbon emissions, as they provide a protective barrier keeping dense forest intact. Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative is a collaborative effort involving over 30 indigenous nations, Pachemama Alliance and Fundación Pachemama. Their vision is to permanently protect 86 million acres of biodiversity rainforest, a biologically rich part of this earth that needs to be saved. Pachemama Alliance offers online and in-person education and eco-journeys, helping all of us to understand our role in sustainability for ourselves and the world.
Using Rotational Farming Soil needs replenishing of nutrients to stay rich and loamy. Planting a variety of crops in one area and rotating their positions every year helps to accomplish this goal versus planting only mono crops such as soy or corn every season.
Reforesting Many organizations plant trees in Amazonia to make up for tree loss due to illegal fires and logging. We can offset our own carbon footprint - especially driving and flying - by contributing to these organizations.
Letting Cattle Roam Allowing cattle to roam to different locations means cows eat more nutritious diets. Therefore, their healthy excrement adds better nutrients to the soil for growing food than if they were eating grain and soy.
NFTP Products and Gold in Amazonia
Selling NFTP Products NFTPs are Non-Timber Forest Products. Too many trees are being burned down for cattle ranching and extractive practices such as gold mining and fracking. These practices poison the air, land and water. A great alternative is to sell medicinal herbs and edibles such Açaí berries, Brazil nuts, Cacao and Honey.
Growing Bamboo Why not use bamboo in place of wood for many products? It grows easily in the Amazon rainforest. It’s a home and hiding place for many insects and animals and a versatile medium that can replace wood so the old growth trees can remain.
Using Blockchain Technology for Gold This system declares the chain of events from miner to trader to gold purchaser. Gold miners can declare their legal status with conflict-free certification before selling gold to traders, and gold refineries can establish authenticity of certification with traders. Gold buyers can also take responsibility to ask merchants to prove with certification that all their transactions were responsible and legal. Ethical jewelers and chip and car manufacturers don’t hesitate to display sourcing information.
Amazonia’s Dry Season
June through October is the dryer season, though it’s never completely dry in the Amazon Rainforest. There is less rainfall and lower humidity than during the wet season. During both seasons, the combination of heat and humidity causes rapid decomposition of plant life and organisms which brings nutrients back into the soil quickly to produce plant growth and photosynthesis (plants absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen). This increases the net carbon sink capacity of this lush forest, slows climate change and stabilizes atmospheric gases.
Sunlight The sun causes evaporation from rivers and transpiration from plants. This moisture contributes to rain formation, which sustains the rainforest’s wet and humid climate. Thanks to this sun-powered process, Amazonia even makes much of its own rainfall.
Drier and Drier Seasons The dry season in the Amazon Rainforest is a natural part of its climate cycle, but it is increasingly being altered and intensified by human activities. Amazonia is experiencing more intense and longer dry seasons which increases the risk of drought. This weakens the forest’s ability to absorb carbon and may push it toward becoming a savanna-like ecosystem which would disrupt Amazonia’s unique system of climate regulation.
Challenges for Aquatic Animals The Amazon Rainforest is facing increasing challenges during the dry season, especially as human activity intensifies its effects. These animals have evolved natural strategies to survive seasonal changes, but deforestation, damming, and pollution are making it harder for them to adapt.
Amazonia’s Wet Season
November through May is Amazonia’s wet season. The rains bring flooding yearly. This is a positive aspect of a cycle which continually brings freshwater into the Atlantic Ocean. Forests inundated by water are particularly efficient carbon sequesters because the water blocks the oxygen required for carbon to decompose into the atmosphere. Large trees store vast amounts of carbon in their trunks, branches and roots. Many tree species synchronize their fruiting with the flood season, so fruits float and disperse via the water.
Roots Under Water Sequestering Carbon Some trees develop aerenchyma tissue—spongy tissue in roots and stems that helps transport air from above the surface to the roots. Roots are engineered by nature to survive floods, absorb nutrients, and manage oxygen scarcity. The whole system helps regulate climate, rainfall, and biodiversity globally.
Slower Falling Rain The Emergent layer and Canopy of Amazonia limit the quickness with which rain falls onto the forest floor. Rain sometimes takes ten seconds to reach all of the microorganisms on the forest floor which helps the forest ecology thrive.
Rain Producing a Rich Web of Life Rain fills rivers, streams, and flooded forests—essential for aquatic and semi-aquatic species. Bountiful amounts of it encourages the growth of many fruits and flowering plants, providing food for all inhabitants. It renews the forest, fuels life, prevents destruction by fire, and helps stabilize both regional and global climates. During flooding in the Amazon Rainforest, land animals experience dramatic changes in their environment—yet many are well adapted to these conditions.
How Do You Feel About this Exhibit?
I would Love to know how you feel about this exhibit, and, if you like, please answer some or all of these questions in an email to me: [email protected]
What is your biggest insight from this exhibit?
Which actions you could take to contribute to lessening your carbon emissions?
Which painting(s) is(are) your favorite(s) and why?
Thank you for visiting NURTURE! Blessings on your own journey,
Julie
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