Additionally, if deforestation alone was not enough, a severe drought in 2020 together with the COVID-19 pandemic has created a devastating synergism between forest loss, fires, which produce particulate air pollutants, and related health risks, endangering Amazonian Indigenous and traditional peoples [3]. According to a report just released by the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE), deforestation within Indigenous lands has reached 331.1 km2 in 2021 [2]. Combining a geographic object-based image analysis (GEOBIA) to map LULC with the Brazilian Biomass Burning Emission with Fire Radiative Power (3BEM_FRP) model, they estimated the dangerous particulate pollution (particles with a diameter less than 2.5 µm, PM2.5) produced by deforestation and fire. According to the authors, deforestation is an important driver of emissions in Amazonia but does not explain biomass burning alone.
Protecting Amazonia Should Focus on Protecting Indigenous, Traditional Peoples and Their Territories