Jair Bolsonaro is a name feared by environmental and human rights activists in Brazil and the rest of the world.

2018 President-elect of Brazil is concerned that the protection of the Amazon has been hindering economic growth for the country and is ready to make some changes. Mr. Bolsonaro claims that Brazil can no longer tolerate having so much land set aside as indigenous territories, national parks, and conservation zones.

As a part of his campaign, he promised to exploit the already diminishing rain forest and to rollback protections of indigenous rights. While there are two federal agencies who serve to protect the precious Amazon, known by their acronyms, FUNAI, and IBAMA, their budgets will undoubtedly suffer under Bolsonaro.

The Amazon rainforest is a gigantic ecosystem (roughly one-third of the world's remaining tropical rainforests) that supports 10% of all known species in the world including many native tribes. About 120 billion tons of carbon is stored in the trees of the Amazon and about half of all the annual rainfall is transpired by the forest back into the atmosphere which affects rainfall as far away as Texas.

The destruction of this precious environment means displacing many species to face extinction including thousands of people who rely on the resources held in the Amazon to survive. Due to the enormous amount of CO2 stored in these trees, cutting them means releasing all of that gas into the atmosphere, strengthening global warming. Other effects of Bolsonaro's dreams include loss of species, displacing indigenous tribes, and disruption of the water cycle, and soil erosion that will affect the water supply of many organisms.

Take a look at the some of the species Bolsonaro will be destroying.

The Jaguar.

https://olhares.sapo.pt/heliconias-foto6798313.html

Heliconia.

A Kinkajou.

An Ocelot

https://theculturetrip.com/south-america/brazil/ar...

The Bullet Ant.

These species specific to rainforest ecosystems that are rapidly being destroyed to accommodate the growing population and the food demand that comes with it. President Bolsonaro has already made up his mind that the economic standing of his country depends on the exploitation of this land mass and we can only hope environmentalists will fight back. If Bolsonaro's plan of destruction follows through, the detrimental effects the climate will undergo will be irreversible.