Editing Geography of Brazil (section)

== Soil and vegetation ==
[[Image:Amazon.A2002182.1405.1km.jpg|thumb|250px|The Amazon Rainforest]]

Brazil's tropical soils produce almost 210 million tons of grain crops per year,<ref>{{cite web|title=Ibge statistics|url=http://www.ibge.gov.br/home/estatistica/indicadores/agropecuaria/lspa/lspa_201507_7.shtm}}</ref> from about 70 million hectares of crops.<ref>{{Cite web |last=dcadmin |date=2024-07-27 |title=MAAP #214: Agriculture in the Amazon: New data reveals key patterns of crops & cattle pasture |url=https://www.maapprogram.org/maap-214-agriculture-in-the-amazon-new-data-reveals-key-patterns-of-crops-cattle-pasture/#:~:text=(70%20million%20hectares) |access-date=2025-01-08 |website=MAAP |language=en-US}}</ref> The country also has the 5th largest arable land area in the world.<ref>{{Cite web|title=World Development Indicators {{!}} DataBank|url=https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=AG.LND.ARBL.HA|access-date=2021-08-18|website=databank.worldbank.org}}</ref> Burning also is used traditionally to remove tall, dry, and nutrient-poor grass from pasture at the end of the dry season.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Until mechanization and the use of chemical and genetic inputs increased during the agricultural intensification period of the 1970s and 1980s, [[coffee]] planting and farming, in general, moved constantly onward to new lands in the west and north.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> This pattern of horizontal or extensive expansion maintained low levels of technology and productivity and placed emphasis on quantity rather than the quality of agricultural production.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

The largest areas of fertile soils, called terra roxa (red earth), are found in the states of [[Paraná (state)|Paraná]] and [[São Paulo]].<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> The least fertile areas are in the Amazon, where the dense [[rainforest]] is.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Soils in the [[Northeast Region, Brazil|Northeast]] are often fertile, but they lack water, unless they are [[irrigation|irrigated]] artificially.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

In the 1980s, investments made possible the use of irrigation, especially in the Northeast Region and in [[Rio Grande do Sul]] State, which had shifted from grazing to [[soy]] and [[rice]] production in the 1970s.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> [[Savanna]] soils also were made usable for soybean farming through acidity correction, [[fertilization]], [[plant breeding]], and in some cases spray irrigation.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> As agriculture underwent modernization in the 1970s and 1980s, soil fertility became less important for agricultural production than factors related to capital investment, such as infrastructure, mechanization, use of chemical inputs, breeding, and proximity to markets.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Consequently, the vigor of frontier expansion weakened.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

The variety of climates, soils, and drainage conditions in Brazil is reflected in the range of its vegetation types.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> The Amazon Basin and the areas of heavy rainfall along the Atlantic coast have tropical rain forest composed of [[Broad-leaved tree|broadleaf]] evergreen trees.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> The rain forest may contain as many as 3,000 [[species]] of [[flora]] and [[fauna]] within a {{convert|2.6|km2|sqmi|0|sp=us|adj=on}} area.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> The Atlantic Forest is reputed to have even greater biological diversity than the Amazon rain forest, which, despite apparent homogeneity, contains many types of vegetation, from high canopy forest to bamboo groves.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

In the semiarid Northeast, [[caatinga]], a dry, thick, thorny vegetation, predominates.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Most of central Brazil is covered with a woodland savanna, known as the [[cerrado]] (sparse scrub trees and drought-resistant grasses), which became an area of agricultural development after the mid-1970s.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> In the [[Southern Region, Brazil|South]] (Sul), needle-leaved [[pine]]woods (Paraná pine or [[araucaria]]) cover the highlands; grassland similar to the Argentine [[pampa]] covers the sea-level plains.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> The Mato Grosso [[swampland]]s ([[Pantanal]] Mato-grossense) is a [[Florida]]-sized plain in the western portion of the Center-West (Centro-Oeste).<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> It is covered with tall [[grass]]es, [[Woody plant|bush]]es, and widely dispersed trees similar to those of the cerrado and is partly submerged during the rainy season.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

[[Image:Brazil veg 1977.jpg|thumb|350px|Natural vegetation map of Brazil, 1977. The "Paraná pine" (''[[Araucaria angustifolia]]'') is a [[conifer]] but not a [[pine]], pines are not native to the Southern Hemisphere.]]
Brazil, which is named after reddish dyewood ([[pau brasil]]), has long been famous for the wealth of its tropical forests.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> These are not, however, as important to world markets as those of Asia and Africa, which started to reach depletion only in the 1980s.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> By 1996 more than 90% of the original Atlantic forest had been cleared, primarily for agriculture, with little use made of the wood, except for araucaria pine in Paraná.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

The inverse situation existed with regard to clearing for wood in the Amazon rain forest, of which about 15% had been cleared by 1994, and part of the remainder had been disturbed by selective logging.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Because the Amazon forest is highly heterogeneous, with hundreds of woody species per [[hectare]], there is considerable distance between individual trees of economic value, such as [[mahogany]] and Pereira.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Therefore, this type of forest is not normally cleared for timber extraction but logged through high-grading or selection of the most valuable trees.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Because of vines, felling, and transportation, their removal causes destruction of many other trees, and the litter and new growth create a risk of [[forest fire]]s, which are otherwise rare in [[rainforest]]s.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> In favorable locations, such as Paragominas, in the northeastern part of [[Pará]] State, a new pattern of timber extraction has emerged: diversification and the production of [[plywood]] have led to the economic use of more than 100 tree species.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />

Starting in the late 1980s, rapid deforestation and extensive burning in Brazil received considerable international and national attention.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> [[Satellite image]]s have helped document and quantify deforestation as well as fires, but their use also has generated considerable controversy because of problems of defining original vegetation, cloud cover, and dealing with secondary growth and because fires, as mentioned above, may occur in old pasture rather than signifying new clearing.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> Public policies intended to promote sustainable management of timber extraction, as well as sustainable use of nontimber forest products (such as rubber, [[Brazil nut]]s, [[fruit]]s, [[seed]]s, [[vegetable oil|oils]], and [[vine]]s), were being discussed intensely in the mid-1990s.<ref name="Hudson-1998" /> However, implementing the principles of sustainable development, without irreversible damage to the environment, proved to be more challenging than establishing international agreements about them.<ref name="Hudson-1998" />