As many people may already know, the largest rainforest in the world happens to be the Amazon Rainforest. What people don’t know though, is that currently Brazil is destroying the land. Most likely due to agricultural reasons being housing or more land to build on. Although this is great to create more space for people, it’s destroying a lot of different things that are affected worldwide. The oxygen created by the trees is lessened which affects everyone, and a lot of species are being killed off due to loss of habitat.

The Amazon Rainforest is home to over 3 million species of plants and animals. As deforestation continues, these species are pushed out of where they live and where they thrive. A lot of the animals living in these areas have been forced into endangerment or even extinction. One of the biggest species affected by this would be the Brazilian Amazon Scarlet Macaw. “It’s native environment is humid and green tropical forests. The species has suffered from a local extinction tragedy from deforestation” (mygreenlifedeforestationinbrazil.com). This is just one of many other animals who are losing their home and their lives to deforestation.

According to bbc.com, “The Amazon is a vital carbon store that slows down the pace of global warming”. With less and less of the forest each day, it means we lose a big source of carbon and even some oxygen production during the process. This is bad news because carbon can help with the process of getting rid of global warming. While it won’t do it on its own it is a contributor to slowing it down. One of the main reasons that deforestation has increased since only last year is from the new presidency in Brazil. New president Jair Bolsonaro has encouraged the continuation of deforestation in order to improve agriculture and mining activities. 

Shown in the picture is part of the progress in deforestation. It shows how they do it, which includes burning of the trees and big machines disturbing the property. It is releasing toxins into the air from the trees and even shows home to multiple animals being destroyed.