Location

A Little History

The tropical Savanna of Brazil is the second largest Biome in South America and represents 23 percent of the country. Another word for this Biome is Cerrado, which came from the Portuguese language meaning dense, closed. The first detailed account of the Brazilian Cerrados was discovered by a Danish botanist named Eugene Warming in 1892. There is little fossil evidence of the geological history but they are suggestions that it existed in the prototypic form in the Cretaceous, which is before the final separation of South American and Africa Continents.  The climate is like your typical savanna it receives 50 to 100cm of rainfall. The arrangement of its great age and dynamic phase in distribution is most likely cause of this rich biodiversity. Seasonal fires also play a vital role in the savannas biodiversity. The tropical Savanna in Brazil is home to 160,00 species including plants animals and fungi. This biome also contains an abundance of forests and rich soil. Although Unlike the African Savannas, Brazil has lost the fauna of large mammals, but now the reintroduction of grazers; the cattle and horses take the place of those faunas and restored the balance of vegetation. In the past Brazilian country people populated the Cerrado. Native vegetation provided resources for houses, seasonal fruits, fiber, firewood and other products. But now recently it hs become connected to modern Brazilian life due to railroads and roads.

Current Human Impacts

Human Impacts for this biome include agriculture and grazing by cattle. During the last 25 years modern agriculture had developed. Some of the Products include soya (Brazil accounts for a about a third of the world soyabean exports) maize, rice, beans and sugar. Coffee produced in the Cerrado is also important export. There is a huge number of cattle that are raised in planted pastures. Two of the farms in Brazil are the frontier of Brazilian Farming. Brazil has turned itself from a food importer to one of the world’s great breadbaskets. It is the first tropical food giants. Between 1996 and 2006 the total value of the countries crop rose from 23 billion to 108 billion. Also today this region contributes more then three quarters of the beef cattle production in the country. It overtook Australia’s in beef exports and considered the world’s largest exporter. It also has the worlds largest cattle herd after India’s. Charcoal production for Brazilian steel industries cause great destruction of this biome. Tree trunks and roots are often used in the production of charcoal.

Future Prospects

I think the likely future after researching on the current human impacts is that Brazils Cerrado is going to grow as a big agriculture industry. But the fires caused by humans in this biome will destroy the savanna. It has been reported from the Conservation International Researchers that around 1.5 percent of the region of grasslands are cleared each year by fires. So that’s a big danger. So I hope the Brazilian government is aware of that and should try to find a way to limit the number of fires happening in this biome. Also the Brazilian steel industry gives the smokey look to the savanna and gives reasons why people do not care about savanna. This might be a problem in the future because when something looks ugly to people, they will tend to not care for it, which creates a bigger problem.

Improving Human Impacts

To maintain positive, I think they should keep the agriculture up and keep farming. Clearly food is important and natural resources are needed so continuing increasing the crop value is the way to go. Also to really look after this biome, watching the fires and keeping the savanna a savanna should be important and to maintain positive human impacts on this ecosystem.

References

http://aob.oxfordjournals.org/content/80/3/223.full.pdf

http://www.economist.com/node/16886442

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10661-009-0988-4?LI=true

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/compound-eye/2012/06/13/ant-science-in-brazil-a-photo-essay/

http://www.ehow.com/info_7843983_endangered-species-savanna-biome.html

https://php.radford.edu/~swoodwar/biomes/?page_id=105