Animals in Brazilian rainforests are disappearing much faster than previously thought, according to a study released this week.
Along the eastern coast of Brazil, what was once a giant rainforest has been fragmented into smaller pieces after decades of logging to clear space for agriculture. The researchers studied nearly 200 fragments of the Atlantic Forest, which once covered 1.2 million kilometers. Now, almost 93 percent of the rainforest has been converted to farmland.
Even though the researchers focused on the best-preserved remnants of the forest, including areas as big as 12,000 acres, they reported finding “unprecedented rates of local extinctions.” They studied 18 rainforest animals in each forest fragment. On average, only four of those mammals were present, and none of the areas contained all 18. Even some of the largest areas, with full canopies intact, had few of the species remaining.
Some of the mammals already appear to be extinct, or nearly extinct. There was no evidence of white-lipped peccaries, a species similar to pigs, anywhere in the rainforests. Jaguars, giant anteaters, woolly spider monkeys and lowland tapirs were only found in a tiny fraction of the studied forests. Smaller mammals, like marmosets and titi monkeys, were still surviving, though their numbers are also declining.
Hunting, poaching and increased damage from “edge effects” — drying and fire risks as more forest edges are exposed to cleared land — are also harming wildlife. The researchers recommend more protected areas. Unfortunately, the opposite is currently happening: More reserves are being downsized or converted into farmland.
Main photo credit: Paulo B. Chaves/Flickr

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The world doesn't need more farmland,  we need  indigenous people to be able to make a living harvesting rainforest plants, herbs and flowers  thereby maintaining the existence of thriving rainforests globally.

Terra bio Tech purchases from suppliers who meet this criteria in countries around the globe (view Ingredients interactive on your website for an idea of the scope of the areas affected).   As demand for the Nectr products goes up, so does the profitability of  saving the rainforest  to the countries where they exist.  Help us  preserve  the world's rainforests from developers, ranchers, and miners  in the only way they can be protected:  by making their preservation more valuable than their destruction!  In that way, rainforest restoration can be put on the fast track.


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