Amazon Records Highest Deforestation Rate In A Decade

The Brazilian Amazon Institute of Man and Environment (Imazon) reported on Friday that deforestation in the rainforest hit the highest annual level in a decade, with a devastated area in July alone, larger than the city of Sao Paulo.

Photo Insert: The news of the alarming deforestation rate in the Brazilian Amazon comes as disasters being connected to climate change have become rampant all over the world.

"From August 2020 to July 2021, the period is known in Brazil as the “deforestation calendar”, the biome saw 10,476 km² of its forest being destroyed, an equivalent area of the expanded Rio de Janeiro," Imazon told the Latin American news agency TeleSur.

"The devastation in the Brazilian Amazon has been advancing in great strides in the last 10 years. In July alone, 2,095 km² were deforested, 80% more than in the same month of 2020. The area is larger than the city of São Paulo!"

The institute has been monitoring deforestation in the Amazon rainforest since 2008. According to Imazon, the 12 months from July 2020 to the present, reported the highest devastation since 2012. One of Amazon's latest studies reveals that in the last 36 years Brazil has burned over 20 percent of its territory.

From August 2020 to July 2021 deforestation was 57 percent higher than the previous year during which 6,688 km² were devastated.

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