July 13, 2010
Source: StateNews.com
Ten days and 700 miles sounds like the formula for a teenager’s road trip, but add illegal loggers, unpaved roads and the heart of the Amazon, and it becomes an important research mission.
Bob Walker, an MSU geography professor, recently returned from a trip along the Transamazon Highway that began June 5, where he observed logging operations in the Amazon rainforest.
During his trip, Walker found signs that preventative measures being taken against illegal logging have been effective, a somewhat “surprising” discovery.
The Transamazon Highway is a 3,000 mile stretch through Brazil from the Atlantic coast to the Peruvian border.
Although Walker did not traverse the entire Transamazon during his trip, the latest trek means he has traveled the entire highway through combined visits.
Walker was accompanied by Eugenio Arima, a former student of Walker’s and an assistant professor of environmental studies at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, and Ritaumaria De Jesus Pereira, an MSU graduate student studying geography.
The existence of the Amazon rainforest is threatened by illegal logging, Walker said.
If the rainforest shrinks, it will not be big enough to sustain the water cycle that keeps its climate moist.
Currently, 17 to 18 percent of the eastern Amazon has been deforested, and many experts consider 30 percent to be a danger zone, Walker said.
Walker said he did not see as many sawmills in the western half of the Transamazon Highway as he had seen in the eastern half, where he traveled last year.
He said he saw both illegal operations in the western half as well as the Brazilian government’s regulatory measures trying to protect the forests through the creation of national parks.
Investigating logging sites came with a level of risk, he said.
The trio was escorted out of one logging site they visited because the loggers were afraid they were government officials who might close down their operation.
In the eastern half of the Amazon, at least 18 people have been killed because of logging disputes, he said.
“The loggers can get very defensive or very aggressive,” Walker said. “This is illegal logging.”
Logging also is the first step toward larger, more destructive forms of development, Walker said.
Removing specific trees and building roads lead to settlers developing the land and ranchers clearing the forest altogether.
“The result is deforestation for sure,” Pereira said.
“But those people were living in poverty, most of them are in the northeastern of Brazil without any land to produce.”
Walker said his next step is to inform the scientific community about what he saw on the highway through scientific papers and a workshop he plans to hold in Brazil.
Walker’s research was funded by the National Science Foundation, or NSF.
Since August 2008, he has received more than $151,000 for his research of road building and logging in the Amazon.
Thomas Baerwald, a senior science advisor for the NSF, said about one in six funding proposals received by the foundation are approved.
Walker has funded multiple projects through the NSF.
“Bob has been successful in formulating problems and issues that draw on and look at questions many researchers have been examining, but enhances and expands the types of inquiries that are done,” Baerwald said.