Amazon rainforest deforestation influenced by clandestine and regular roadway network

Neves, Patricia Bittencourt Tavares das; Blanco, Cláudio José Cavalcante; Duarte, André Augusto Azevedo Montenegro; Neves, Filipe Bittencourt Souza das; Neves, Isabela Bittencourt Souza das; Santos, Marcelo Henrique de Paula dos

doi:10.1016/j.landusepol.2021.105510

Cited by 20 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Striking gaps in road maps are not at all unusual, especially for developing nations 2 – 10 . For instance, studies in the Brazilian Amazon 6 , 33 , 34 , Cameroon 35 and the Solomon Islands 10 , 36 also detected many unmapped or illegal roads, ranging from 2.8 to 9.9 times those recorded in OSM or government sources—values that broadly overlap with and even exceed those observed in our Asia-Pacific study area. Protected areas in this region provided considerable protection against road incursions, containing just a third as many roads as did comparable unprotected areas (Fig.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 49%

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Engert,

Campbell,

Cinner

et al. 2024

Nature

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Roads are expanding at the fastest pace in human history. This is the case especially in biodiversity-rich tropical nations, where roads can result in forest loss and fragmentation, wildfires, illicit land invasions and negative societal effects1–5. Many roads are being constructed illegally or informally and do not appear on any existing road map6–10; the toll of such ‘ghost roads’ on ecosystems is poorly understood. Here we use around 7,000 h of effort by trained volunteers to map ghost roads across the tropical Asia-Pacific region, sampling 1.42 million plots, each 1 km2 in area. Our intensive sampling revealed a total of 1.37 million km of roads in our plots—from 3.0 to 6.6 times more roads than were found in leading datasets of roads globally. Across our study area, road building almost always preceded local forest loss, and road density was by far the strongest correlate11 of deforestation out of 38 potential biophysical and socioeconomic covariates. The relationship between road density and forest loss was nonlinear, with deforestation peaking soon after roads penetrate a landscape and then declining as roads multiply and remaining accessible forests largely disappear. Notably, after controlling for lower road density inside protected areas, we found that protected areas had only modest additional effects on preventing forest loss, implying that their most vital conservation function is limiting roads and road-related environmental disruption. Collectively, our findings suggest that burgeoning, poorly studied ghost roads are among the gravest of all direct threats to tropical forests.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 49%

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Engert,

Campbell,

Cinner

et al. 2024

Nature

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“…Such initiatives include the proposed bills PL490/2007 and PL191/2020, allowing mining and hydropower dams within Indigenous lands, and the so called land-grabbing bills PL2633/2020 and PL510/2021, which grant an amnesty to land-grabbers and invaders that irregularly occupy exploited and deforested federal lands (Aleixo & Junior, 2022). Consequently, activities that increase deforestation in the southern Amazon such as land grabbing, illegal logging, mining and fire are being facilitated against a backdrop of impunity and a lack of governance (Azevedo-Ramos et al, 2020; Cardil et al, 2020; Pereira et al, 2020; das Neves et al, 2021; Mataveli et al, 2021). Even a small number of misguided and irresponsible policy decisions can significantly worsen an already difficult future scenario for Amazonian primates (Estrada et al, 2018; Carvalho et al, 2019; Sales et al, 2019).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using population surveys and models to reassess the conservation status of an endemic Amazonian titi monkey in a deforestation hotspot

Silva

Pacca²,

Lemos³

et al. 2022

Oryx

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Assessing the conservation status of species is essential for implementing appropriate conservation measures. A lack of evidence of threats, rather than showing an absence of impacts, could reflect a lack of studies on how human activities could result in species population declines. The range of Prince Bernhard's titi monkey Plecturocebus bernhardi is restricted to the Arc of Deforestation, a deforestation hotspot in south-eastern Amazonia. Despite this, it is categorized as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List. To reassess the conservation status of P. bernhardi, we carried out surveys during 2015–2017 to delimit the geographical distribution of the species and estimate its population density and abundance. We then used spatial predictive modelling to examine future habitat and population loss within its range. Plecturocebus bernhardi occurs over an area of 131,295 km2. Its mean group size was 2.8 individuals/group and its density 10.8 individuals/km2 and 3.8 groups/km2. Habitat loss was estimated to be 58,365 km2 (32.3% of its current range) over the next 24 years (three P. bernhardi generations) under a conservative governance model of deforestation and 105,289 km2 (58.3%) under a business-as-usual model. These numbers indicate that P. bernhardi is threatened and should be categorized as Vulnerable, at least, using the IUCN Red List criteria. We recommend the reassessment of other Least Concern primate species from the Arc of Deforestation using a similar approach.

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“…All simulations were evaluated through the Global Warming Level (GWL) index. In this study, the GWL index was defined as the year in which Specific Warming Level (SWL2) is observed (HELIX, 2014;dos Santos et al, 2020). The one value (global mean temperature) is considered from the control simulation as the climatological mean .…”

Section: Numerical Simulationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, the influence of global mean temperature warming coupled with Amazon deforestation may affect thousands of people who live in that region like climate hazards (Ruv Lemes et al, 2020), socio‐economic issues (das Neves et al, 2021) and health Urrutia‐Pereira et al (2021). For example, Alves de Oliveira et al (2021) identified several heat risks for the northern Brazilian region, and the Amazon savannization process has been shown to be already occurring Nobre et al (2016), mainly in the eastern part of the Amazon.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impacts of atmospheric CO₂ increase and Amazon deforestation on the regional climate: A water budget modelling study

Lemes

Sampaio

Fisch

et al. 2022

Intl Journal of Climatology

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Global air temperature increase has caused changes in the global climate such as droughts, floods and severe events. Land cover shifts and the increase in greenhouse gas emissions can intensify these impacts. Therefore, the application of Specific Warming Level 2 (SWL2) technique has been considered to evaluate the global warming issue in various climate scales, which may induce different responses in the climate system. The objective of this study is to evaluate the impacts of a doubling of current atmospheric CO2 concentrations as well as the influence of deforestation of the Amazon Forest on the climate of South America. In this study, the CPTEC‐BAM1.2 global model was used to simulate these processes. The first scenario of simulations considered doubled atmospheric CO2 concentration (2XCO2 = 776 ppm) and the second scenario is the total conversion of the Amazon Forest to pasture (DEF). In the third scenario both CO2 and deforestation are considered simultaneously (2XCO2 + DEF). A control simulation considers the natural Amazon Forest shape and a steady CO2 concentration of 388 ppm. Results suggest that the temperature increased in all scenarios, the highest increment in the 2XCO2 + DEF experiment (5.4°C in 2XCO2 + DEF, 5.1°C in DEF and 3.2°C in 2XCO2). The model simulated drastic negative rainfall anomalies in each of three scenarios (2XCO2 + DEF: −2.1 mm day−1, 2XCO2: −1.3 mm day−1 and DEF: −0.9 mm day−1). Besides less precipitation and evapotranspiration, shifts in moisture transport were identified in each of the three scenarios. The effect of doubled atmospheric CO2 produces results similar to deforestation for hydrological water budget changes, and total pasture conversion may intensify such changes.

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Amazon rainforest deforestation influenced by clandestine and regular roadway network

Cited by 20 publications

References 29 publications

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Using population surveys and models to reassess the conservation status of an endemic Amazonian titi monkey in a deforestation hotspot

Impacts of atmospheric CO₂ increase and Amazon deforestation on the regional climate: A water budget modelling study

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Amazon rainforest deforestation influenced by clandestine and regular roadway network

Cited by 20 publications

References 29 publications

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests

Using population surveys and models to reassess the conservation status of an endemic Amazonian titi monkey in a deforestation hotspot

Impacts of atmospheric CO2 increase and Amazon deforestation on the regional climate: A water budget modelling study

Contact Info

Product

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Impacts of atmospheric CO₂ increase and Amazon deforestation on the regional climate: A water budget modelling study