Fire in the Amazon: Chaco's forests are also in danger

While the world shivers for
fires in the Amazonthe
native forests of the
Argentina they also meet
in a state of siege.

Official reports and studies by scientific institutes and NGOs show that hundreds of thousands of hectares of these natural treasures are lost each year and provide essential services for life and socio-economic development.

After the
Amazon, Gran Chaco is the largest forest ecoregion in the Americas and the one of greatest concern. It is one of the 11 most important deforestation points in the world and, according to a work of the Wildlife Foundation (FVSA) carried out with the technical support of INTA, if nothing changes, in 2028, it will have lost an area equivalent to 200 times the city of Buenos Aires. Aires.

Another study, conducted this time by Greenpeace, warned earlier this year that in the north of the country, four provinces concentrate 80% of the clearings: Santiago del Estero, Chaco, Formosa and Salta, and that 36.3% of the surface . deforested during the period badyzed corresponded to natural forests.

The Chaco Ecoregion extends into much of Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia and a small part of Brazil. Its forests, shrubs, meadows, savannahs, swamps and wetlands make it unique in the world.

It is also the largest reservoir of native forest in the country. "Although it is a semi-desert area due to climatic parameters, it retains the trees with the hardest wood in the world," said Gustavo Sosa, Forest Engineer and founder of Inbioar, a research and development company on natural herbicides.

According to estimates, "Between 2007 and 2014, there was a loss of 1.95 million hectares of forest at an annual rate of land clearing comparable to that of the world's largest sources of deforestation," he said. Manuel Jaramillo, Director of FVSA – If the same trend continues, by 2028, there will be an additional loss of four million hectares. "

And with the forest, its ability to capture carbon dioxide (greenhouse gas), the biodiversity it hosts and its regulatory action on the hydrology of the plain will be lost. Other non-material goods will also cease to exist, but this influences the quality of life and can stimulate industries such as tourism.

"We ask these ecosystems several things – explains Esteban Jobbágy, agronomist and senior researcher at Conicet of the National University of San Luis- The most demanding is to keep the immaculate library of life for future generations. we can solve by maintaining percentages of about 10% of the forest.We also expect it to store carbon, for which we need much larger areas.And to fulfill its function hydrological, it is necessary to preserve at least 20% to 50% of its surface. "

In addition, according to the researcher, forests have an influence on the climate, even if we do not yet know how. "For example," he adds, "we know that an important part of the rains in Salta, Santiago del Estero and even San Luis comes from the Amazon." In other words, distant forests can have effects on distant precipitation, and temperature conditions. " ".

The country today has about 53 million hectares under the territorial order required by the "Forest Law", promulgated in 2007 and regulated in 2009. a categorization that must be done by the provinces and consists of badigning a color to each area of ​​agreement. with its possible uses: from conservation (red) to the possibility of transformation for agriculture (green), through sustainable use (yellow).

"Of this total, about 11 million hectares are made up of green spaces," says Diego Moreno, secretary in charge of environmental policy at the Natural Resources of the former Ministry of the Environment. "Until 2014 or 2015, about 300,000 hectares were deforested each year, ranging from 150,000 to 170,000, but the law should not be examined solely by the number of deforestations." The main challenge is to determine the type of production that we allow in the yellow zones, because aggressive interventions end up causing the loss of the forest We are looking for management with integrated livestock, a modality to which 10 provinces have already joined. "

Jaramillo, meanwhile, believes that despite the progress made, it remains necessary to implement the system of resource allocation provided by law for yellow and red areas. "The budget has increased in absolute value, but decreased in relative value," he said. "It is necessary that the funds increase and that the provinces are much more agile to implement and return them."

But despite the delicate situation, there is also good news. One of them is that although the advance of farming and farming brings back forests, they are not necessarily lost forever. "In ecosystems such as Chaco, nowadays agricultural lands can become forests again, think differently," says Jobbágy, saying: "They are dry and of course, there are fires, so they have the capacity recover."

In addition, scientists also dispute the idea that it is impossible to link a productive activity with the protection of nature. "It's not one thing or another – says Lucas Garibaldi, director of the Conicet Institute for Natural Resources Research, Agroecology and Rural Development." – We can implement ways to promote the biodiversity."

And Jobbágy said: "For this to be possible, a very thorough discussion between the actors on the territory will be necessary.In our Chaco, the problem is that production occurs on an industrial scale, it is different from that of the Family farming, this can be practiced in Africa, we need to promote the agreements, it is difficult and there are no automatic recipes. "

Specifically, in a document circulated yesterday afternoon in the elections, the FVSA said: "We need to establish a new pact between nature and people that will reverse the loss of biodiversity on Earth. and degradation of natural ecosystems – and how we generate, transmit and consume energy – these are the systems we need to reorganize if Argentina wants to grow steadily. "