Cropped 16 August 2023: Amazon Summit; Hawaii’s wildfire aftermath; Indonesia peat investigation

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s Cropped. 
We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.

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Leaders of the eight Amazon basin countries agreed to join forces to protect the crucial rainforest, but did not set targets to end deforestation or to halt oil and gas expansion. 

The deadliest wildfire in the US in over a century ravaged the island of Maui, killing at least 106 people and destroying diverse ecosystems.

A new investigation found that large areas of “restored” peatland in Indonesia may be more vulnerable to burning than government statements suggest. 

Amazon Summit 

TIPPING POINT: Last week, leaders or high-ranking ministers of the eight Amazon basin countries met under the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization for the first time in 14 years, committing to join forces to prevent the rainforest “from reaching the point of no return”. Carbon Brief covered the outcomes of the two-day meeting in Brazil. In the Belém Declaration, countries recognised that the Amazon is approaching a “tipping point”, called for developed nations to fulfil their climate and biodiversity finance commitments and pledged to protect the rights and territories of Indigenous peoples. Two notable omissions from the declaration were region-wide commitments to ending deforestation by 2030 and to halting oil and gas expansion. 

NO TIMELINES: Indigenous leaders and Amazon experts told Carbon Brief that they are worried about the implementation of the declaration due to the lack of specific targets. Prof David Lapola, an ecologist at the State University of Campinas in Brazil, said: “We are always expecting more than these big summits tend to deliver for us in terms of concrete measures or actions.” But he and other experts noted that bringing these countries together to discuss the Amazon is an achievement in itself. Fany Kuiru, a Colombian Indigenous leader, told Carbon Brief: “If governments do not work hand in hand with Indigenous peoples, local communities and other sectors that live in the Amazon, we will not be able to materialise the declaration into real actions.”

ECUADOR OIL VOTE: Elsewhere in the Amazon basin, Ecuadorians will soon vote in a binding referendum on whether they want oil drilling to continue in a national park “deep in the northern Amazon rainforest”, Mongabay reported. On 20 August, voters will take to the polls to decide on the future of oil drilling in Yasuní National Park, which has “long been considered one of the most biodiverse [areas] on the planet”, the outlet said. A second referendum will also take place to decide the future of mining in the Andean Chocó forest. The forest is designated as a UNESCO biosphere reserve, but there are currently a dozen mining concessions “in the early stages of exploration in the region”. The two referendums are scheduled on the same day as the country’s next presidential election. 

Hawaii’s wildfire aftermath

‘ENVIRONMENTAL CATASTROPHE’: The death toll from last week’s wildfires on the Hawaiian island of Maui has reached 106, with about one-third of the affected area searched, CNN reported. The fires are already the deadliest to hit the US in more than a century. “Experts fear a broader environmental catastrophe is only just starting to unfold,” the Washington Post wrote, pointing to “impacts on native plants and animals that aren’t adapted to thrive with fire”. The newspaper added that the native flora and fauna “carry cultural significance to Indigenous Hawaiians, support the local economy and contribute to driving tourism to the islands”. 

WATER WORRIES: Toxic runoff, debris and ash from the fires could all harm the island’s coral reefs, which are some of the oldest in the state, the Washington Post reported. It noted that “the fires come at a time when Hawaii’s coral reefs are already stressed” by bleaching, coastal development and pollution. The US Coast Guard is now turning its attention “to cleaning up debris and pollution in the sea”, the Honolulu Star Advertiser wrote, adding that the fires have left the waterfront “littered with debris and potential toxic leaks”. Fresh water continues to be a concern as well, as “an unsafe water advisory continues to be in effect” for several parts of the island, the Maui News wrote. It added: “Residents are unable to treat the water in any way to make it safe.”

INVASIVE GRASSES: The Washington Post wrote that the wildfires “were exacerbated by a dried-out landscape and the spread of flammable invasive grasses across abandoned farm fields”. It added that non-native grasses can “bounce back more easily after a blaze, crowding out the regrowth of native species and creating more fuel for the next fire”. Experts told the newspaper that it will take time to understand if native plants will be able to recover. The interim manager of the Maui Invasive Species Committee, Teya Penniman, wrote in the Maui News that “efforts to restore native ecosystems impacted by invasive species can’t reset the clock – we can never truly regain what was lost”. She added: “But it’s worth it to try.”

CLIMATE CONNECTION: Many outlets made the connection between the wildfires and climate change, pointing to a warming and drying climate that left the island susceptible. The Atlantic wrote: “The world doesn’t need more reminders that climate change is accelerating. But we’re going to keep getting them.” The magazine added that “we are running out of time to protect ourselves” and “when something beautiful burns, you can never truly get it back”. Nature wrote that “wildfires are not new to Hawaii” but they are “getting worse and more frequent”. It added that forecasters “were predicting below average precipitation and drought for Hawaii” in May. Climate data is particularly lacking in Hawaii, the publication added, as it is the “only state without a dedicated climate division within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration”.

Indonesia peat investigation

RESTORATION DOUBTS: Large areas of “restored” peatland in Indonesia may be more vulnerable to burning than the government has acknowledged, according to a new investigation by the Gecko Project. The Indonesian government has claimed that up to 3.66m hectares of peatland have been restored, meaning the peat has been rewetted in order to reduce fire risk. But the investigative journalism nonprofit found that, based on government data, the average area registered as rewetted has stayed at around 2.7m hectares since 2018 “and has not increased over time”. The outlet said the government appeared to use a narrow definition of “restoration” but that, even by their definition, the restored areas “have never reached the figures cited in official documentation and may in fact be far lower”. 

‘DEVASTATING’ FIRES: In 2015, a “notorious wildfire season” burned through hundreds of thousands of hectares of Indonesia’s tropical peatlands and resulted in a “noxious haze” blamed for sickening hundreds of thousands of people in south-east Asia, the Gecko Project said. Years of draining peatlands for agricultural development left them vulnerable to decomposition and burning. The “devastating” 2015 fires prompted the country’s president to launch an “ambitious plan to restore the nation’s peatlands”, the nonprofit wrote. The government’s “claims to have made huge progress” on this are “not supported” by publicly available data, it added. 

EL NIÑO RISKS: The Gecko Project found multiple peatland areas where water levels were consistently lower than required for the government’s restoration threshold. This highlighted a “possibly heightened fire risk as this year’s El Niño event progresses”, the outlet said. Prof David Taylor, a peatland expert at the National University of Singapore, added: “Big El Niños over the last thirty years or so have been associated with drought here in south-east Asia [and with] peatland fires…I think it’s going to be a test of claims that have been made that these peatlands have been restored.” The Gecko Project said that the Indonesian ministry of environment and forestry did not respond to requests for comment. 

COLD TURKEY: Turkey has officially withdrawn as the host of COP16, the UN biodiversity summit set to take place next autumn, according to a statement released by the Convention on Biological Diversity. The statement cited the three earthquakes that devastated the country in February 2023 as the reason for the move. The Guardian wrote that the upcoming summit “will be an important test of international commitment to the ambitious targets” agreed upon at last year’s COP15, “which need to be met by the end of the decade”. It further noted that “informal talks on progress” will occur at the COP28 climate summit, which begins in Dubai in late November.

MASS BLEACHING: Coral reefs across the world – from China to the Caribbean – are at high risk of bleaching, according to the latest Coral Reef Watch report from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Coral Reef Watch coordinator Dr Derek Manzello told the Guardian: “We are marching towards a Caribbean-wide coral bleaching event in the next month if things don’t change.” The newspaper added that many of these regions are still weeks away from when they typically reach peak temperatures, “suggesting the situation could worsen without sustained cloudy weather or major storms”. Meanwhile, Australia’s ABC News covered the newly released 2022 Great Barrier Reef report card, which found that bleaching on the reef occurred last year for the first time during a La Niña episode, which is characterised by cooler ocean temperatures off Australia. While not as deadly as previous bleaching events, it “did enough damage to counteract gains”, the outlet wrote.

FOREST LAW FLAK: Reuters reported that the Indian government’s changes to a 1980 law aimed at reducing deforestation “is drawing protests from environmental activists who fear the changes will lead to unchecked commercial activity and infrastructure development in green areas”. Some activists are “exploring a legal challenge”, while the government is maintaining the position that the changes are vital “to the livelihood aspirations of the local communities”. The newswire added: “Opponents say India’s new law will also change how it defines forests, and so it will apply to fewer green zones, leading to about 20-28% of existing forest cover losing regulatory protection.”

COVERT CARBON CONTRACT: The west African country of Liberia is “set to concede 10% of its territory” to a United Arab Emirates-based company that will use the 1m hectares of forest to generate carbon credits, Le Monde reported. The agreement will be officially announced at COP28, the newspaper added. According to Le Monde, the “secretly negotiated contract is raising serious concerns” about the rights of the landowners and populations living in the territory earmarked for conservation. Africa Times wrote that “it’s not clear how a new deal would affect” an existing agreement between Liberia and Norway for forest conservation. 

CASH FOR WILDLIFE: A large protected area in Mozambique is “thriving”, partly due to local involvement in wildlife conservation, National Geographic reported. The outlet called the Niassa Special Reserve, which is larger than the country of Switzerland, “one of the biggest African wildernesses the world has never heard of”. The magazine detailed one project that aimed to boost community income, food production and local needs, while also including people in conservation projects. The organisation that runs the project pays money into a fund to reward “wildlife-friendly behaviour” – $8 for every lion or elephant spotted by a tourist, for example. “Villagers are encouraged to protect wildlife and habitat. The more animals, the more tourism dollars, the rationale goes,” National Geographic said. 

WYE OH WYE: The largest poultry supplier in the River Wye’s catchment area, which covers more than 4,000 square kilometres across the England-Wales border, will no longer sell poultry litter “to be used as fertiliser on fields within the river catchment because of the impact it has on water quality”, BBC News reported. The outlet wrote that “24m chickens are farmed and their waste is spread as fertiliser, but some of it washes into the river when it rains”, leading to the recent downgrading of the river’s status by Natural England. Farmers Weekly added: “The move has received a ‘cautious welcome’ from environmental campaigners.” A separate BBC News piece quoted the head of the Welsh farmers’ union as saying that halting production “is not the method for addressing these issues”, but pointed out that research has shown that “up to 70% of the phosphate load in the River Wye originates from agriculture”. 

HAWAIIAN WILDFIRES: The Heated newsletter interviewed the national director of the Green New Deal Network, an Indigenous Hawaiian, about the root causes of the recent wildfires – and how to rebuild.

OCEAN POWER: A piece in Energy Monitor looked at “blue carbon” and its possibilities –  and limitations – for carbon removal. 

NEW IPCC HEAD: The new chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Prof Jim Skea, spoke to the BBC’s the Climate Question podcast about climate concerns and the challenges ahead for the scientific body. 

AMAZON’S UNDERWORLD: An investigative collaboration by InfoAmazonia explored the “devastating impact” of illegal mining and drug trafficking on the Amazon.

Enumerating soil biodiversity
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

New research found that soil could be the “most biodiverse singular habitat”, housing around 59% of species on the planet. Researchers reviewed biodiversity literature around global species predictions to identify the different estimates of global and soil-specific species richness. The researchers said their estimates showed approximately two times greater soil biodiversity than previous studies. The study noted that soil biodiversity research is “highly fragmented and speculative”, and therefore these estimates are an initial attempt to bring efforts together and highlight future knowledge gaps. The figures provide “a staggering enumeration to the value of conserving soil biodiversity”, the study authors wrote. 

Pathways framework identifies wildfire impacts on agriculture
Nature Food

A new study identified three main pathways through which wildfires impact agricultural resources, labour and products. Researchers performed an “extensive” review of the scientific literature, reports and news articles. They found that agriculture can be harmed through a “direct” pathway, such as by damage to livestock or cropland; through a “downwind” pathway, such as by particulate matter and other pollutants; or through a “downstream” pathway, such as by impacting water quality. The authors wrote that the work “highlight[s] the complexity of wildfire-agriculture interactions and the need for collaborative, systems-oriented research” to better understand wildfire-agriculture interactions and “inform the adaptation of agricultural systems to an increasingly fire-prone future”.

Coral reefs benefit from reduced land-sea impacts under ocean warming
Nature

Coral reef ecosystems are being “fundamentally restructured” by human impacts and marine heatwaves, according to a new study. Researchers developed a 20-year dataset spanning the time before, during and after an “unprecedented” marine heatwave in Hawaii which took place from 2014-16 to analyse human impacts on land and sea and the environmental factors known to affect coral reefs. The findings showed that mitigating local human impacts on the land and sea simultaneously can promote reef persistence after severe heat stress and also reduce coral loss during a marine heatwave. The researchers concluded that actions to support coral reef resilience, alongside reducing greenhouse gas emissions, “may buy reefs more time to adapt and persist into the future”.

Cropped is researched and written by Dr Giuliana Viglione, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Daisy Dunne, Orla Dwyer and Yanine Quiroz. Please send tips and feedback to [email protected]