Tens of thousands of acres of Amazon rainforest is being destroyed to construct a summit road for the upcoming COP30 climate summit in Belém, Brazil.
Extensive deforestation is taking place in the Amazon rainforest to construct a four-lane highway for the upcoming COP30 climate summit in Belém, Brazil. The road, stretching eight miles, is being built to transport an estimated 50,000 delegates to the November UN conference.
The Brazilian government claims the highway is “sustainable”, featuring bike lanes, solar power, and animal crossings, but this development has sparked outrage among local residents and environmental groups.
Claudio Verequete, a local who used to harvest açaí berries from trees near his land, said to the New York Post, “Everything was destroyed. Our harvest has been cut. We no longer have that income to support our family. Our fear is that one day someone will come here and say: ‘Here’s some money. We need this area to build a gas station, or to build a warehouse.’ And then we’ll have to leave. We were born and raised here in the community. Where are we going to go?”
Professor Silvia Sardinha, a wildlife vet and university animal hospital researcher, said, “We are going to lose an area to release these animals back into the wild, the natural environment of these species…Land animals will no longer be able to cross to the other side too, reducing the areas where they can live and breed.”
The Amazon rainforest plays a crucial role in absorbing carbon and maintaining biodiversity. Conservationists warn that this deforestation threatens wildlife and could push the rainforest closer to a tipping point, potentially transforming it from a carbon sink into a carbon source.
This development raises questions about the environmental cost of hosting large-scale climate conferences. The destruction of protected rainforests for a climate summit undermines the very goals of such gatherings, and if the food served at the event is not fully plant-based (which has never been in previous events), even more so.
Original source: https://veganfta.com
https://www.animalagricultureclimatechange.org/amazon-deforestation/
