Agriculture, Mining and Ranching: Problems and Alternatives (Tri Ngo)
Problems
* 60% of deforestation is caused by shifted cultivators. These are people who are too poor to afford more suitable land for farming. In other words, the native people are not causing the problem.
* 10% of population owns 90% of the land.
* Poor farmers from outside areas attempt to utilize agricultural techniques that are not effective in the Amazon.
- Sustainable agriculture is possible, more land was in use in the amazon during columbus's time then it is today.
Possible Solutions
* Agroforestry is sustainable agricultural techniques developed by indiginous amazonian people.
* Polyculture - patchworks of perenial plants, secondary growth rainforest, pasture, etc. Instead of just clearing all land and planting one crop (monoculture)
* Perenials may be the key. These crops produce for many years. The indiginous people use these.
* Educate farmers about about more effective agricultural techniques so that they clear less land to reach same production level. AKA. increase the yield.
Some sustainable agricultural alternatives
* Rubber
* Some Medicinal Drugs are much easier to obtain from plants than from lab synthesis.
* Foods (Brazil nut, other flavorings)
* Food Colorants
Alternative Agricultural Method: Polycultural Composition
Poor tropical soils wear quickly lose nutrients when developed through monoculture. This leads to inefficient use of fertilezers or additional forest being cleared.
Alternative is to plant fields of polyculture. A key component of this polyculture is the use of perenials. Perennials help restore nutrients to degraded soils. Some appropriate perenials to use are:
* Increased biodiversity in that area as opposed to conventional farming methods.
* Faster recovery when abandoned since ecological cycles are maintained.
Strip Mining
Modern mining abandons old tunnel mine method in favor of "heap-leach" strip mining.
Mining works in two phases
1. Exploration
1. Build extensive network of roads
2. Use drilling rig to take 200-300 core samples of potential site
2. Extraction
1. Area is deforested
2. Nitroglycerine explosives are used to break layers of rocks until a hole measuring approximately 1kilometer square and 50 meters deep is obtained.
3. Trucks taller than jumbo jets are brought in to remove material to an onsite refining facility.
4. The material is sprayed with cyanide to release microscopic deposits of gold.
5. Gold is seperated from cyanide solution by electrolysis.
Approximately 50 tons of rock of rock must be removed to produce one ounce of gold.
Issues after strip mining
1. Acid Mine Drainage (result of oxidation)
1. Resulting waste rock is high in sulfur content and must be submerged to provent oxidation.
2. Causes the slow release of sulfuric acid
2. causes heavy metals to be released in to nearby streams
1. poisons fish, game, and people
Ranching
It is estimated that for every quarter pound hamburger made form rainforest cattle, 55 square feet of rainforest was cleared.
Since the soil is low in nutrients, after a few years of growing grass the soil becomes depleted of nutrients.
United States is the largest consumer of Central American Beef (Not Amazonian!)
Possible Solutions
1. Cut down beef consumption (Highly unlikely)
2. Stop importing rainforest cattle.
1. Current beef labeling laws are not good enough to determine the meat's country of origin.
This page was last updated on October 27, 2002. If you have any questions or comments, please e-mail the webmaster.
