Burnings: a complex phenomenon determined by distinct conjunctures

Abstract

Identified as a major world power for food production, Brazil has, for decades, the misfortune of being known as one of the countries responsible for significant rates of emission of greenhouse gases, especially in terms of emissions from the eradication and burning of natural forest cover for the expansion of the agricultural frontier. The federal government has tried to create and implement, without success, public policies that guarantee the maintenance of the national potential for production and the exploration of the international market for food products, but also reduce the persistent rates of the eradication of natural forest cover. The State of Mato Grosso presents a special case for understanding the relationships between land use and cover, and the incidence of burnings, to join an important environmental and socio-economic diversity. This paper characterizes and maps the dynamic of fires in the State, identifying some of their principal causes, based on spatial and statistical analyses. The results showed the existence of different contexts affecting the occurrence of fires and thereby draw attention to problems in the development of command and control policies, based only on their location and quantification, to permanently change the condition of chronic emergency of the Brazilian Legal Amazon.