The Brazilian Amazon has lost more than 5,000 square miles of forest in the past 12 months, a 15-year high

In the past 12 months, more than 13,000 square kilometers (5019.3281 square miles) of forests have disappeared in Brazil. Amazon, A 15-year high.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro recently pledged to end illegal deforestation this month while United Nations Climate summit, Associated Press Report. The Prodes monitoring system of the National Institute of Space Research released a report containing the numbers before the summit on October 27th.

The report cited the months from August 2020 to July 2021. This is the most forest loss year since 2006.

The deforestation area of ​​the Amazon in one year exceeds 10,000 square kilometers (3,861.022 square miles), and it has been more than ten years. The average area from 2009 to 2018 was 6,500 square kilometers (2509.66403 square miles). After Bolsonaro took office in January 2019, the situation has changed. After that, the annual average area increased to 11,405 square kilometers (4403.4951 square miles). The Amazon forest has lost more area in the past three years than Maryland.

“This is a shame. It is a crime,” Marcio Astorini, executive secretary of the environmental non-profit organization Network Climate Observatory, told the Associated Press. “We have seen the Amazon rainforest destroyed by the government, and the government has made environmental destruction as its public policy.”

Data shows that in the nine states in the Amazon region, 40% of deforestation occurred in Para state from August 2020 to July 2021. Mato Grosso and Amazon states increased by 27% and 55%, respectively. The Associated Press said that deforestation in the past three years accounted for 34% of the total damage.

For more reports from the Associated Press, please see below.

Bolsonaro promised to develop Amazon when he took office and refuted the global outcry for its destruction. His government defied environmental authorities and supported legislative measures to relax land protection and encourage land grabbers. At an investment attraction conference held in the United Arab Emirates this week, he told the crowd that the attacks on deforestation in Brazil were unfair and that most of the Amazon remained pristine.

Early data for the 2021-2022 reference period indicates that the situation has deteriorated further.The space agency’s monthly monitoring system Deter detected Deforestation in September and October increased year-on-yearDeter is not as reliable as Prodes, but is widely regarded as a leading indicator.

Mauricio Voivodic, Executive Director of the International Environmental Organization WWF Brazil, said in a statement after the release of the Prodes data: “This is the real Brazil. The Bolsonaro government tried to use a fantastic speech. And greenwashing operations abroad to cover up this real Brazil.” “The reality shows that the Bolsonaro government has accelerated the path to the destruction of the Amazon.”