What would a world without the Amazon be like?

The figure was given yesterday: according to estimates by the Brazilian National Space Research Institute (INPE), so far this year 72,843 fires have been detected in Brazil. That is, 83% more than during the same dates in 2018. The Amazon is burning like never before.

And "never before" is important, because (if we are precise) "the Amazon has been burning for 15 years". At the gates of the G7, António Guterres, secretary general of the UN, has expressed his "deep concern" and Emmanuel Macron has already described the fires as an "international crisis", but is it true? What makes it different from other major fires? How could it affect us that the Amazon disappeared to become a huge orchard where cattle graze and soy grows?

What burns in Brazil?

Of the 72,843 fires recorded up to mid-August, 52.5% (some 38,228) directly affected the Amazon rainforest; 30.1% (21,942) occurred in the vicinity of the rainforest, in what is called the "Brazilian savannah"; and, finally, 10.9% of the fires affected the forest region that rises on the country's Atlantic coast.