Unfortunately, it has been the target of deforestation and other environmental issues for numerous years. Its trees, though many, have been harvested at below a sustainable rate. During the past 40 years, close to 20 percent of the Amazon rain forest has been cut down--more than in all the previous 450 years since European colonization began. Brazilian deforestation is strongly correlated to the economic health of the country: the decline in deforestation from 1988-1991 nicely matched the economic slowdown during the same period, while the rocketing rate of deforestation from 1993-1998 paralleled Brazil's period of rapid economic growth. But one could argue that deforestation and a bustling economy are not directly related, just correlated at a time in which domestic output and exports are in high demand.
At the center of all conservation efforts is the battle between economic expansion and biological sustainability and preservation. Deep in the heart of the Brazilian Rainforest, the Chief of the Surui people, Chief Almir has decided to make a stand against the deforestation of his people's territory. He has been chief of his people since he was 17 and was educated in a Brazilian University, fluent in Portuguese. He has become a political activist but has chosen to maintain the culture into which he was born. The Surui people first made contact with the "outside" world in 1969 and due to illness, hunger and other causes the population dwindled down to 250 from 5,000.
He has chosen a method to fight deforestation and promote the preservation of his land that most of the western world would not expect coming from a rain forest tribe in the Amazon. They are using internet technologies, specifically Google maps, YouTube, laptops and digital photography. The Surui people have learned how to utilize this technology to pinpoint where the boundaries of their territory exist through GPS technology (Google maps). They have also created videos that are geo-tagged which provide stories from elders on the land, history or some special site and then upload them to YouTube. This project has been in effort to push the campaign against Amazonian deforestation.
The Surui people were also taught by employees at Google how to take pictures of illegal logging and immediately upload them to the internet so that law enforcement has the necessary evidence to prosecute the illegal activity. The Surui keep watch over their land through google maps and look for any signs of deforestation, though they are desiring a more up-to-date method of spying on loggers and protecting their land more quickly.
In a YouTube video provided below, around the 14:30 mark, Chief Almire begins to talk about defending the forest and facing an economic reality. "But what we can understand, for those that understand the forest, we know that it can become a source of economic growth and well-being for the world. Through it (that is, defending the forest) we can bring a green development which creates a sustainable future."
Do we truly understand the value of something, or are we searching for immediate benefit? In this Amazonian example, we are discussing deforestation as our immediate benefit of consumption. There is obviously an economic gain, but at what cost? In 1989, environmentalist C.M. Peters and two colleagues stated there is economic as well as biological incentive to protecting the rain forest. One hectare in the Peruvian Amazon has been calculated to have a value of $6280 if intact forest is sustainably harvested for fruits, latex, and timber; $1000 if clear-cut for commercial timber (not sustainably harvested); or $148 if used as cattle pasture.
Chief Almir is convinced that the Amazon forest has the potential to provide to the world economically outside of consuming it. The question is, does the rest of the world?
Sources
http://www.mongabay.com/brazil.html
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/habitats/last-of-amazon/
http://www.fastcompany.com/most-creative-people/2011/chief-almir-surui-amazon-tribe
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/amazon.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p83fgOvgtnk&feature=player_embedded
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