Slash and Burn Agriculture
Left: Biomass burning in East Amazon Basin. Photo: NASA Earth Observation Images

In response to our Tropical Poison module Katarina B. L. Berg, a teacher and landowner in Sao Paulo, Brazil wrote:

Burning fields and pastures is very common here in Brazil. There are two reasons for it: bugs, rodents, snakes etc. and the acidity of the land. On our little farm, we could only convince the field hands to stop burning once we showed them how to use chemicals - fertilizers and insecticides - which got into the lake and caused minor disaster. One of the big problems in Brazil is the workers we have. In no way are they ignorant, but (they) have not had sufficient exposure to "modern technologies" to enable them to discern about the use of chemicals etc.

Right: Biomass burning in South America. Photo: NASA Earth Observation Images

 

 

[ Slash & Burn Agriculture ] [ From the Seat of the Bulldozer ] [ Regrowth in a Tropical Rainforest ]
[ Data Collection in the Amazon ] [ Colonization of the Rainforest ] [ Loving the Rainforest to Death ]
[ Frogs in the Rainforest ] [ Tropical Deforestation & Habitat Destruction ]
[ The Importance of Forests & the Perils of Deforestation ] [ Hamburgers in the Rainforest ]
[ References ] [ PBL Model ] 

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