The international biofuel targets are leading to a rapid increase in demand for feedstock crops such as sugar cane, oil palm and soy. Brazil is currently the world’s biggest exporter of sugar and of ethanol. The Brazilian government has seen this as an export opportunity and wants ethanol to be recognized as an international commodity.
However, the expansion of sugar cane pushes the farming border (other framing activities) close to Amazonian forests; farms tend to grow more sugar cane rather than staple food because of economic interests. Increasing land values-and lack of available suitable land have driven sugar cane expansion into other states, most of this expansion is expected to be in the Midwest, home to the Cerrado, a vast tropical savanna. The area covered by sugar cane in Cerrado is predicted to increase by 365 per cent by 2035.
During the expansion, in the southern central region, 60%of the land previously used for grazing cattle has been displaced. Also, sugar cane is expanding into previously uncultivated areas, particularly in the Cerrado and Pantanal, sugar cane is replacing soybean in some parts of Goias where some 20 new sugar cane and ethanol plants have opened.
Sugar cane expansion is also displacing pasture, ranchers and other crop. The current expansion in ranching is considered the main factor in the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, the number of cattle in Amazon has increased significantly.
São Paulo is an important source of food for the south east region, but figures for 2007 show that maize, soy, wheat and bean cultivation in São Paulo decreased. Framers in the state had chosen to lease their fields to sugar-ethanol plants or to plant sugar cane, as this was three times more profitable. As land values increase near urban areas, less profitable agricultural activities are pushed into forested areas.
When farmers move to the Amazon, trees and other vegetation are burned or cleared to make way for pasture, reducing the capacity to store and sequester carbon. As land is cleared, soil starts oxidizing, releasing massive amounts of stored carbon. While precise calculations are difficult, emissions from indirect land use change are significant. Now, huge areas are being cleared in the Triângulo Mineiro, Pará, Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul for sugar and soybean – how are they going to look 100 years from now?