A Belgian study has revealed that the “critically slow” progress of the Amazon Forest’s self-renewal process since 2015 is due to drought.
The study, led by researchers from Belgium’s KU Leuven University, examined the “resilience” of the Amazon Forest to drought. The researchers examined satellite images of vegetation activity from 2001-2019, analyzed them monthly and compared them with local rainfall data.
In this way, the researchers examined how the frequency, intensity or duration of droughts affected the balance of Amazonian vegetation and found that the self-renewal process of adult vegetation in the region tended to slow down by 37 percent.
“In general, forests are still showing great resilience, which is a positive thing, but since 2015 we have seen a significant slowdown in tropical rainforest regeneration,” said Van Passel, one of the researchers, emphasizing that the severity and duration of droughts “destabilize the forest.”
The Amazon Forest, whose ecosystem’s regeneration is largely dependent on rainfall, is described as the “lung of the world” because it produces most of the oxygen on Earth. The results of the study were published in the journal “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences”.
