GEO Brasil - UNEP

In the Amazon and the Cerrado biomes, pressure
on vegetation cover tends to increase. This is
mainly due to the increase of cattle breeding
activities and exportation agricultural activities.
In the Cerrado area, water resources are already
found in a critical level. The tendency is to
worsen, considering the continuation of the
present occupational pattern and the pressure
on environmental conditions.
In Caatinga there are permanent social-spatial
inequalities as far as urban and rural
infrastructure equipment is concerned. These
cause significant effects on the living conditions
of the population. High levels of environmental
illness tend to increase. When we speak about
agriculture activities and cattle breeding,
pressure on biodiversity, water resources, soil
and subsoil continue to be affected by the
reduced technological level used in such
activities. While there have been slight
improvements in some production areas, there
are improvements that bring new problems, for
example, the salinisation of soil provoked by
irrigation.
In the Zona dos Cocais, big projects in urbanindustrial
areas caused changes. Although they
had a short reach, they had considerably high
environmental costs. Traditional extraction
systems can not compete on the regional and
national markets and run the risk of disappearing
with huge losses in terms of sociodiversity.
In the Southern Fields area, problems caused
by inadequate use of soil and intense use of
fertilisers and biological insecticides have
provoked desertification. Pressure tends to
increase on water resources, soil and subsoil if
these elements remain. To prevent this process,
necessary measures should be taken in the long
term bases.
The resulting impact of such dynamic is included in Source-Pressure-
Impacts. The critical level of urban-industrial areas may be found here,
specially regarding atmospheric pollution problems. These include
water resources, subsoil, surface and water tables. This pollution
originates from different sources, but results in life deteriorating
conditions. Deteriorating life conditions are increasing due to critical
inefficiency and unequal distribution of urban equipment and public
services.
The Coastal Zone suffers pressure from activities
in the area such as extraction and transport of
petroleum and gas, or marine trade. These occur
in urban and periurban area activities and in the
occupation of areas along the coast. They
include deforesting mangrove areas and rocky
coastlines. This compromises water bodies
beds by insufficient treatment of chemical and
organic effluents.
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