{"id":9439,"date":"2025-06-17T16:31:19","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:31:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=9439"},"modified":"2025-06-17T16:31:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:31:19","slug":"fire-and-agriculture-drive-soil-degradation-in-the-southern-brazilian-amazon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=9439","title":{"rendered":"Fire and Agriculture Drive Soil Degradation in the Southern Brazilian Amazon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Study shows that carbon and nitrogen losses from the soil persist for nearly a decade after burning, and conversion to agriculture causes even more severe impacts<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Frequent forest fires and agricultural expansion are degrading soil health in the southern Brazilian Amazon. This results in lasting damage to carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) stocks, as well as to the overall functionality of ecosystem soils. These findings are presented in a study conducted by researchers from Brazil, the United States, and the United Kingdom at the Tanguro Research Station, located in the transition zone between the Amazon Rainforest and the Cerrado (the Brazilian savannah-like biome), in the Amazonian Arc of Deforestation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re talking about a fire that isn\u2019t natural. In the Arc of Deforestation, record fires result from a combination of agricultural and livestock expansion, degradation of neighboring native forests, and prolonged droughts caused by climate change \u2013 all promoted by human action,\u201d says researcher M\u00e1rio Lucas Medeiros Naval<\/strong><\/a>, the lead author of the study. \u201cOur work shows how these successive fires have a long-term impact on organic matter and other essential soil attributes and how this compares to agriculture in the region,\u201d he comments.<\/p>\n

The study, published<\/strong><\/a> in the journal Catena<\/em>, analyzed the effects of forest conversion to agriculture and the frequency of burning on soil organic matter, as well as various physical and chemical indicators of soil health. The researchers compared four scenarios: an intact forest, a forest burned annually, a forest burned every three years, and an area converted to agriculture under a no-till system with crop rotation.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur results show a 17% decrease in soil carbon stocks with annual burning, 19% with triennial burning, and 38% with agricultural conversion,\u201d says Naval. \u201cEven when agriculture adopts good practices, such as crop rotation and cover crops, it still generates more severe soil carbon losses than fire in native forests.\u201d<\/p>\n

The researcher explains that the area studied is a transition forest similar to the \u201cCerrad\u00e3o\u201d (a biodiversity-poor forest formation), with trees averaging 20 meters in height. \u201cIt isn\u2019t as tall as the forest in the center of the Amazon, but it\u2019s also not Cerrado sensu stricto. And it\u2019s precisely in this region that the agricultural frontier has advanced the most, mainly with soybeans,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The research was conducted in a 150-hectare experimental area managed by the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM) within the legal reserve of a private property where the Tanguro Research Station is located. \u201cWe had access to a large area with 50 hectares for each treatment type, enabling us to obtain a representative sample,\u201d the researcher points out.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn important aspect of the study is that we evaluated the soils nine years after the last burn. Even with the forest\u2019s recovery time, carbon and nitrogen stocks were still significantly reduced,\u201d he adds. According to Naval, these losses compromise essential properties given the multiple benefits of organic matter for various soil health indicators. \u201cFor example, our results show that by reducing carbon stocks, much of the cation exchange capacity [CEC, one of the ways of measuring the nutrient retention capacity of the soil<\/em>] is lost,\u201d explains the researcher. Thus, the study also revealed impacts on other physical and chemical indicators, demonstrating broader soil health degradation.<\/p>\n

The research showed that the loss of total carbon \u2013 the sum of the carbon stored in above-ground biomass and in the soil \u2013 reached 33% with annual burning and 48% with triennial burning. \u201cThis shows that, from the point of view of the ecosystem as a whole, fire frequencies have a differentiated impact, even though the statistical difference between the two regimes wasn\u2019t significant in the soil,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnlike the Cerrado, where fire is natural to the ecosystem and plays an ecological role, in the Amazon we\u2019re talking about an element that\u2019s exogenous and induced by changes in land use, not natural burning. Burning the Amazon rainforest means interfering with an environment that isn\u2019t adapted to fire,\u201d Naval summarizes.<\/p>\n

The authors recommend adopting policies that contain the agricultural frontier, prevent forest fires, and implement more biodiverse agricultural systems, such as agroforestry. They argue that these practices store significant amounts of carbon, which is crucial for global climate stability, and maintain the health of Amazonian soils.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe search for alternatives to the conventional agricultural production model is essential not only for environmental preservation, by preventing new fires, but also to ensure food security for the population,\u201d explains researcher Pl\u00ednio Barbosa de Camargo<\/strong><\/a>, one of the study\u2019s coordinators.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Study shows that carbon and nitrogen losses from the soil persist for nearly a decade after burning, and conversion to agriculture causes even more severe impacts Frequent forest fires and agricultural expansion are degrading soil health in the southern Brazilian Amazon. This results in lasting damage to carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) stocks, as well…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":9440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/scx2.b-cdn.net\/gfx\/news\/2025\/fire-and-agriculture-d.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[195],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health-environment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9439"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9441,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9439\/revisions\/9441"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}