14 Slash and Char: An Alternative to Slash
and Burn Practiced in the Amazon Basin
Christoph Steiner1
1
Institute of Soil Science and Soil Geography, University of Bayreuth, 95440 Bayreuth, Germany
,2
, Wenceslau Geraldes Teixeira2
2
Embrapa Amazˆonia...
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14 Slash and Char: An Alternative to Slash
and Burn Practiced in the Amazon Basin
Christoph Steiner1
1
Institute of Soil Science and Soil Geography, University of Bayreuth, 95440 Bayreuth, Germany
,2
, Wenceslau Geraldes Teixeira2
2
Embrapa Amazˆonia Ocidental, CP 319, 69011-970 Manaus, Brasil
and Wolfgang Zech1
14.
1
Introduction
The forested area in the tropics continues to decrease.
It is a challenge to preserve large areas of tropical forest to counteract the accelerating climate
change and loss of biodiversity.
The cumulative deforested area (including
old clearings and hydroelectric dams) in Amazonia up until 1991 reached
427,000 km2
or 11% of the 4 million km2
original forested portion of Brazil’s
5 million km2
legal Amazon region (Fearnside 1997).
Large-scale cattle ranching is mainly responsible for this decline in forest
area.
However, new settlers advancing along the roads also contribute to
deforestation through slash and burn agriculture.
In 1990 and 1991, 31% of
the
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