Number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon second-highest in a decade for August
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Fiery August
According to a report by AFP, the number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon last month was the second-highest in a decade for August, nearing the crisis levels that unleashed a flood of international condemnation last year, official figures showed Tuesday.
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Empty promises
Despite guarantees from President Jair Bolsonaro's government that it is acting to curb the destruction, there were 29,307 fires in the Brazilian Amazon last month, just 5.2 percent lower than August 2019, according to the space agency, INPE.
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Climate change accelerated
Last year the number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon surged nearly 200 percent year-on-year in August to 30,900, sending a thick haze of black smoke all the way to Sao Paulo, thousands of kilometers away. That caused worldwide alarm over the devastation to the world's biggest rainforest, a vital resource for curbing climate change.
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Agricultural burning
August often marks the start of fire season in the Amazon, when farmers and ranchers who have felled trees on their land take advantage of dryer weather to set them alight. Under international pressure, Bolsonaro has deployed the army to the region to crack down on deforestation and fires, and decreed a ban on all agricultural burning.
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Suspect behaviour
But environmentalists remain sharply critical of the far-right leader, a climate-change skeptic who has called to open protected Amazon lands to mining and agro-business. Situated at the southern edge of the Amazon and stretching from Brazil into Paraguay and Bolivia, the Pantanal is known as one of the most biodiverse regions on Earth.