Amazon fires drove unprecedented global forest loss in 2024
It was the first time the annual report, issued by the World Resources Institute and the University of Maryland, showed fires as the leading cause of tropical forest loss, a grim milestone for a naturally humid ecosystem that is not supposed to burn. "The signals in these data are particularly frightening," said Matthew Hansen, the co-director of a lab at the University of Maryland that compiled and analyzed the data. "The fear is that the climate signal is going to overtake our ability to respond effectively."Latin America was hit particularly hard, the report said, with the Amazon biome hitting its highest level of primary forest loss since 2016.Brazil, which holds the largest share of the world's tropical forests, lost 2.8 million hectares (6.9 million acres), the most of any country. It was a reversal of the progress made in 2023 when President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva took office promising to protect the world's largest rainforest.advertisement'This was unprecedented, which means we have to adapt all our policy to a new reality,' said Andre Lima, who oversees deforestation control policies for Brazil's Ministry of Environment, adding that fire, which was never among the leading causes of forest loss, is now a top priority for the government.Bolivia overtook the Democratic Republic of Congo as the second country with the most tropical forest loss despite having less than half the amount of forest as the African nation, which also saw a spike in forest loss last year.Bolivia's forest loss surged by 200% in 2024, with a drought, wildfires and a government-incentivized agricultural expansion as the leading causes. Across Latin America, the report noted similar trends in Mexico, Peru, Nicaragua, and Guatemala.Conflicts in Colombia and the Democratic Republic of Congo also boosted deforestation rates, as armed groups used up natural resources.
The Amazon biome hit its highest level of primary forest loss since 2016. (Photo: Reuters)
Outside the tropics, boreal forests, which evolved with seasonal fires, also posted record-high tree loss in 2024, with Canada and Russia each losing 5.2 million hectares (12.8 million acres) in 2024 as wildfires got out of control.advertisementSoutheast Asia bucked the global trend with Malaysia, Laos, and Indonesia all posting double-digit decreases in primary forest loss, as domestic conservation policy, combined with efforts by communities and the private sector, continued to effectively contain fires and agricultural expansion.Another outlier was the Charagua Iyambae Indigenous territory in southern Bolivia, which was able to keep the country's record fires at bay through land-use policies and early warning systems.Rod Taylor, the global director for forests at the WRI, said that as leaders descend on the Amazonian city of Belem for the next climate summit, he would like to see countries make progress in introducing better funding mechanisms for conservation."At the moment," he said, "there's more money to be paid by chopping forests down than keeping them standing."Must Watch
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The Hindu
8 hours ago
- The Hindu
World's smallest known snake makes big comeback
For nearly two decades, no one had spotted the world's smallest-known snake. Some scientists worried that maybe the Barbados threadsnake had become extinct, but one sunny morning, Connor Blades lifted a rock in a tiny forest in the eastern Caribbean island and held his breath. 'After a year of searching, you begin to get a little pessimistic,' said Blades, project officer with the Ministry of Environment in Barbados. The snake can fit comfortably on a coin, so it was able to elude scientists for almost 20 years. Too tiny to identify with the naked eye, Blades placed it in a small glass jar and added soil, substrate and leaf litter. Several hours later, in front of a microscope at the University of the West Indies, Blades looked at the specimen. It wriggled in the petri dish, making it nearly impossible to identify. 'It was a struggle,' Blades recalled, adding that he shot a video of the snake and finally identified it thanks to a still image. It had pale yellow dorsal lines running through its body, and its eyes were located on the side of its head. 'I tried to keep a level head,' Blades recalled, knowing that the Barbados threadsnake looks very much like a Brahminy blind snake, best known as the flower pot snake, which is a bit longer and has no dorsal lines. On Wednesday, the Re:wild conservation group, which is collaborating with the local environment ministry, announced the rediscovery of the Barbados threadsnake. 'Rediscovering one of our endemics on many levels is significant,' said Justin Springer, Caribbean program officer for Re:wild who helped rediscover the snake along with Blades. 'It reminds us that we still have something important left that plays an important role in our ecosystem.' The Barbados threadsnake has only been seen a handful of times since 1889. It was on a list of 4,800 plant, animal and fungi species that Re:wild described as 'lost to science.' The snake is blind, burrows in the ground, eats termites and ants and lays one single, slender egg. Fully grown, it measures up to four inches (10 centimeters). 'They're very cryptic,' Blades said. 'You can do a survey for a number of hours, and even if they are there, you may actually not see them.' But on March 20 at around 10:30 a.m., Blades and Springer surrounded a jack-in-the-box tree in central Barbados and started looking under rocks while the rest of the team began measuring the tree, whose distribution is very limited in Barbados. 'That's why the story is so exciting,' Springer said. 'It all happened around the same time.' S. Blair Hedges, a professor at Temple University and director of its center for biology, was the first to identify the Barbados threadsnake. Previously, it was mistakenly lumped in with another species. In 2008, Hedges' discovery was published in a scientific journal, with the snake baptized Tetracheilostoma carlae, in honor of his wife. 'I spent days searching for them,' Hedges recalled. 'Based on my observations and the hundreds of rocks, objects that I turned over looking for this thing without success, I do think it is a rare species.' That was June 2006, and there were only three other such specimens known at the time: two at a London museum and a third at a museum collection in California that was wrongly identified as being from Antigua instead of Barbados, Hedges said. Hedges said that he didn't realize he had collected a new species until he did a genetic analysis. 'The aha moment was in the laboratory,' he said, noting that the discovery established the Barbados threadsnake as the world's smallest-known snake. Hedges then became inundated for years with letters, photographs and emails from people thinking they had found more Barbados threadsnakes. Some of the pictures were of earthworms, he recalled. 'It was literally years of distraction,' he said. Scientists hope the rediscovery means that the Barbados threadsnake could become a champion for the protection of wildlife habitat. A lot of endemic species on the tiny island have gone extinct, including the Barbados racer, the Barbados skink and a particular species of cave shrimp. 'I hope they can get some interest in protecting it,' Hedges said. 'Barbados is kind of unique in the Caribbean for a bad reason: it has the least amount of original forest, outside of Haiti.'
Time of India
3 days ago
- Time of India
Trump's NASA budget cuts could compromise human safety, warn hundreds of agency employees in open letter
According to NASA scientists, impending budget cuts could jeopardise mission safety and open the door for another catastrophe similar to the Challenger disaster in 1986. According to Kyle Helson, a research scientist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre and the University of Maryland , "when you're talking about cuts that appear unstrategic and unthoroughly researched and not motivated by actual improvements in mission safety, then you start to get people worried," he told Megan Williams, guest host on If You Happen. Explore courses from Top Institutes in Please select course: Select a Course Category Technology Design Thinking others PGDM Finance Healthcare Product Management CXO Degree Public Policy MCA healthcare Operations Management Project Management Digital Marketing Leadership Data Science Data Science Data Analytics Cybersecurity MBA Artificial Intelligence Management Others Skills you'll gain: Duration: 12 Weeks MIT xPRO CERT-MIT XPRO Building AI Prod India Starts on undefined Get Details In an open letter, Helson joins 362 other NASA personnel, both past and present, who have expressed concern about "recent policies that have or threaten to waste public resources, compromise human safety, weaken national security, and undermine the core NASA mission." by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Learn More - How Watching Videos Can Boost Your Income TheDaddest Undo NASA official Bethany Stevens downplayed the worries in an email to CBC. "NASA will always prioritise safety. Any cuts, including the one we're making voluntarily right now, will be made to safeguard roles that are vital to safety," she stated. Live Events US savings of $6 billion are being proposed President Donald Trump of the United States is proposing a 25% budget decrease for NASA overall, or around $6 billion US ($8.22 billion Cdn), and a 50% cut for the scientific research division. "President Trump has proposed billions of dollars for NASA science, demonstrating an ongoing commitment to communicating our scientific achievements," Stevens stated. According to Helson, that is radically dishonest but technically true. "That's like saying your bicycle is missing one wheel, but don't worry, you've still got another wheel," said the man. The Congress that controls NASA's budget has not yet approved Trump's cuts. However, a number of senior officials stated they will proceed with them regardless in audio that was leaked from a NASA town hall meeting last month. The leading Democrats on a House committee that is in charge of NASA's budget, Zoe Lofgren and Valerie P. Foushee, have stated that it would be "flatly illegal" and "offensive to our constitutional system" to impose the cuts too soon. NASA has been urged by the bipartisan committee to refrain from making the changes. Fears of retaliation Addressed to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, whom Trump named interim NASA administrator earlier this month, is the open letter known as The Voyager Declaration. Calls for comment were sent to NASA by Duffy's office. In particular, the declaration highlights worries that if NASA keeps going in this direction, current missions will be cancelled, important scientific data will be lost, international partners will be dropped, development programs will be discontinued, staffing will be completely cut, and safety precautions will be reduced. It comes after similar open letters were sent by employees of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the latter of which suspended 144 of the signatories. Similar retaliation is feared by NASA employees Only four signatories who currently work with NASA are willing to speak out on record, and about half of those who signed the letter did so anonymously, according to NIH and EPA representatives and Stand Up For Science, the group that organised the letter. Among those four, Helson claims that the only reason he feels comfortable speaking is because he works with NASA in collaboration with the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, which he claims allows him greater academic freedom than those who work directly for NASA. "A lot of my coworkers who are civil servants are very afraid right now, and so I want to use what I perceive to be my advantages in my position to speak out on their behalf," he stated. "People are afraid that they're going to lose their job." When CBC asked NASA if it would take revenge on the signatories to the letter, NASA did not answer. The letter is formatted as an act of "Formal Dissent," a reference to a NASA policy that gives staff members the right to voice their opinions on choices they feel are "not in the best interest of NASA." The New York Times claims that the policy was implemented in response to the fatal Challenger space shuttle disaster in 1986 and the Columbia space shuttle disaster in 2003, when some engineers' concerns were dismissed. All seven of the astronauts on board perished when the Challenger broke apart seconds into its ascent on January 28, 1986. On February 1, 2003, the seven-person crew of the Columbia perished when it broke apart during re-entry. Signatories to the letter express concern that the changes will affect other programs intended to avoid such tragedies. "The culture of organisational silence promoted at NASA over the last six months already represents a dangerous turn away from the lessons learnt following the Columbia disaster," the letter continues. The Official Declaration of Voyager sent by signatories of ex-NASA and NASA officials to NASA's Interim Administrator Duffy Dear Interim Administrator Duffy, In light of your recent appointment as Interim NASA Administrator, we bring to your attention recent policies that have or threaten to waste public resources, compromise human safety, weaken national security, and undermine the core NASA mission. We, the signatories of this letter, dissent from these policies, and raise these concerns because we believe strongly in the importance of NASA's mission, which we are dedicated to uphold. Major programmatic shifts at NASA must be implemented strategically so that risks are managed carefully. Instead, the last six months have seen rapid and wasteful changes which have undermined our mission and caused catastrophic impacts on NASA's workforce. We are compelled to speak up when our leadership prioritizes political momentum over human safety, scientific advancement, and efficient use of public resources. These cuts are arbitrary and have been enacted in defiance of congressional appropriations law. The consequences for the agency and the country alike are dire. Main concerns raised by the officials 1) The officials oppose any modifications to NASA's Technical Authority capabilities that are motivated by factors other than mission assurance and safety. Already, the organisational quiet culture that NASA has fostered over the past six months is a risky departure from the lessons learnt in the wake of the Columbia tragedy. The Technical Authority system should only be altered to improve safety, not in anticipation of future budget cuts, as was proposed at the NASA Town Hall on June 25. 2) The officials oppose the termination of missions for which Congress has approved funds because it would permanently deprive the United States of its ability to operate both on Earth and in space. Operational spacecraft cannot be restarted after they are decommissioned. Furthermore, the next generation of vital observations could be lost if missions in development are cancelled. 3) Because indiscriminate cuts to NASA's scientific and aeronautics research would deprive the American people of the special public benefit that NASA offers, the officials oppose their implementation. Fundamental space science, aviation, and environmental stewardship research are fundamentally governmental tasks that the private sector cannot and will not undertake. Additionally, NASA promotes national security by ensuring that the United States maintains its leadership in science and technology, and it generates economic activity that roughly triples the return on investment. 4) Because NASA's non-strategic staffing reductions will compromise the agency's primary mission, the officials oppose them. In the process of terminating, resigning, or retiring early thousands of NASA civil servants have taken with them highly specialised, irreplaceable knowledge that is essential to NASA's mission. 5) The officials oppose NASA's decision to stop participating in foreign missions because it would be betraying America's allies. The Artemis Accords have been ratified by 55 countries to date, and NASA's position as the global leader in space exploration is in jeopardy if we stop supporting missions with our longstanding partners at the European Space Agency (ESA), Canadian Space Agency (CSA), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and others. 6) Because it hurts state and local economies nationwide, the officials oppose the cancellation of NASA funding and contracts for non-performance-related reasons. By eliminating competitive grant selection procedures, arbitrary contract and grant termination undermines private entrepreneurship and lowers the amount of private sector jobs related to the space economy. 7) Because it diminishes NASA's ability to innovate for the good of humanity, the officials oppose the termination of programs designed to train and support the agency's personnel. The agency's primary value of inclusion is squarely at odds with cuts to diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessible programming that have already been put into place. The country's future space economy workforce would suffer a severe damage if the Office of STEM Engagement were abolished.
NDTV
4 days ago
- NDTV
Once Feared Extinct, Scientists Find World's Smallest Snake In Barbados
A snake so small it could be mistaken for a worm has been spotted in Barbados, nearly two decades after it was thought to have been "lost" to science. The Barbados threadsnake (Tetracheilostoma carlae) was found hiding under a rock in central Barbados during an ecological survey in March by the Barbados Ministry of the Environment and National Beautification and conservation group Re:wild. "Barbados threadsnakes are blind snakes, so they're very cryptic," said Connor Blades, a project officer with the Ministry of Environment in Barbados who helped make the finding, in a statement. "They're quite rare also, it seems. There have only been a handful of confirmed sightings since 1889, so there are not many people who have ever seen it, unfortunately." Measuring just three to four inches long (eight to 10 centimeters) when fully grown -- tiny enough to almost fit on a US quarter coin -- the Barbados threadsnake is the world's smallest species of snake. It is distinguished by orange stripes along its back, eyes on the sides of its head and a small scale on its snout. "When you are so accustomed to looking for things and you don't see them, you are shocked when you actually find it," said Justin Springer of Re:wild, who made the discovery alongside Blades. "You can't believe it. That's how I felt. You don't want to get your hopes up too high." The breakthrough came after more than a year of searching, as the pair upturned rocks trapped beneath a tree root. The tiny snake, which was found alongside an earthworm, was taken to the University of West Indies for careful examination under a microscope -- it closely resembles the Brahminy blind snake, an invasive species, so the finding had to be validated -- before it was returned to the forest. Only two percent of the Caribbean island's primary forest remains intact, with the rest cleared for agriculture since the start of the colonial era 400 years ago. The Barbados threadsnake remains particularly vulnerable since it reproduces sexually and females lay a clutch of only one egg. Female Brahminy blind snakes, by contrast, can produce fertile eggs without mating. "The threadsnake's rediscovery is also a call to all of us as Barbadians that forests in Barbados are very special and need protection," said Springer. "Not just for the threadsnake, but for other species as well. For plants, animals and our heritage." (Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
