Record number of forest fires in Brazil Amazon

Aerial view of downtown Manaus covered by smoke from fires in the Amazon rainforest, Amazonas State, Brazil, on August 14, 2024. Agence France-Presse

MANAUS, Brazil. — The Brazilian Amazon has recorded more than 37,000 forest fires so far this year, the worst number in nearly two decades, according to satellite data released Wednesday.

The number was 111 percent higher than in the same period of 2023, said Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE).

Since the INPE started collecting data in 1998, more fires were recorded in the same period only in 2005, 2004 and 2003.

READ: Explainer: Causes and consequences of Amazon fires and deforestation

From January 1 to August 13, a total of 37,835 fires were noted in the Brazilian Amazon this year.

The Amazon suffered a historic drought between June and November last year, conducive to fires that have also affected the Pantanal, one of the world’s largest tropical wetlands which lies south of the rainforest.

Last week, the World Weather Attribution (WWA) said in a report that the hot, dry, windy conditions that fueled the Pantanal fires had been “40 percent more intense due to climate change.”

READ: Amazon’s demise accelerated by warming, deforestation–study

The latest data makes for difficult news for the government of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, with the number of fires increasing even as deforestation in the Amazon — which helps reduce global warming by absorbing carbon dioxide — is on the wane.

Lula has pledged to put a stop to illegal deforestation of the Amazon by 2030.

The practice had dramatically worsened under his far-right predecessor Jair Bolsonaro.