Logging = business of cutting down trees and transporting logs to sawmills
● Selective logging = cutting trees which are mature/inferior → to encourage growth of remaining trees in forest
● Commercial farming = farming to sell produce for a profit to retailers/food-processing companies
● Subsistence farming = type of agriculture → producing food/materials for the benefit of only farmer and family
● Tropical rainforest of Brazil is being exploited in 2 main ways:
○ Using its resources
■ Logging
■ Mineral extraction
■ Energy development
■ Illegal wildlife trade
○ Clearing forest to make way for activities
■ Cattle farming
■ Crop farming
■ Road building
■ Settlement and population growth
Logging:
● Logging is the first step in the conversion of
forest land to other uses
● Timber companies are most interested in trees
such as mahogany and teak
○ Sell them to other countries to make
furniture
● Smaller trees used as wood for fuel, or made
into pulp or charcoal
● Vast areas are cleared in one go = clear felling
Mineral extraction:
● Minerals needed by developed countries are
found under rainforest
● In Amazon, mining is mainly for gold
● In 1999 → 10000 hectares of land was being
used for gold mining
○ Now 50000+ hectares used
● Rainforest suffers due to clear felling for mining
● Same applies to extraction of other minerals
(eg/ bauxite from which aluminium is made)
Energy development:
● Dams built to generate HEP (hydroelectric
power)
● Involves flooding vast areas of rainforest
○ Submerged forest gradually rots →
makes water acidic
○ Acidic water corrodes HEP turbines
○ Dams become blocked with soil
washed down deforested slopes by
rain
Illegal wildlife trade:
● Hunting, poaching and trafficking
(dealing/trading) → big business in Brazil
● Endangers species
○ eg/ jaguar, golden lion tamarind
● Upsets the natural balance of the rainforest
ecosystem → degrades rainforest
Cattle farming:
● Large areas cleared to make space for
livestock rearing
● Accounts for 80% of rainforest destruction
● Land cannot be used for long → quality of
pasture quickly declines
○ Cattle farmers have to move on and
destroy more rainforest
Crop farming:
● Forest cleared to make space for plantations
○ eg/ bananas, palm oil, pineapple are
grown
● Soybean cultivation has caused much forest
clearance in Amazonia
○ Amount of rainforest cleared doubled
between 1990 and 2010
● Soil will not sustain crops for long → after a few
years more rainforest has to be cut down
Road building:
● Roads are needed to bring equipment and
transport products to markets
○ Clear felling is necessary
● Roads make forest accessible for other
exploiters
○ eg/ Trans-Amazonian Highway is
4000km long (began in 1972)
■ Opened up remote areas of
rainforest
Settlement and population growth:
● All activities need workers
● Workers and families need homes and
services
● Forest is cleared to build settlements where
these people can live
