Who said it is fast approaching the point

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Select another language:. Please enter your email address: Submit. Powered by CITE. The dictatorship, which endured until , built military bases, power plants, and a network of roadways throughout the thick jungle. But these were some of the darkest days for the rainforest itself. Millions of people migrated inland from coastal cities, carving homesteads and huge industrial hubs out of the jungle.

In 40 years, the Amazon has lost an area as big as California to deforestation. Some scientists suggest the Amazon is now close to a tipping point, at which it will become a savanna rather than a rainforest. It will pump greenhouse gases into the atmosphere instead of pulling them down, and so-called flying rivers—bands of moisture in the air that bring rainfall to the continent—will dry up.

As many as 10, species may be at risk of dying off. Since taking office in January , Bolsonaro, a former army captain, has revived the year-old worldview that Amazon development and Brazilian prosperity go hand in hand.

No roads. No ranchers. Just rainforest. Edmo Ferreira Pinto, 49, is proud to take credit for the transformation. He fancies himself a modern-day Robin Hood who stole from the state to give to the poor. For years government ads on TV and radio and in newspapers had promised plots and prosperity for anyone willing to make the journey. The trip took a week. They sat on wooden benches, a tarp offering shade from the scorching sun. After the military dictatorship gave way to a democracy, Incra was given a new mission.

It was one of the largest social welfare giveaways of all time. But the execution was bungled. People rushed to claim whatever plots appeared to be free. Wealthy owners stripped of their properties fought in court to save their stakes, tying the land up for decades.

Documents were easily forged or altered to make bogus titles look legitimate. A resale black market for the dubious claims proliferated. They were still living in tarp-covered shacks without water or electricity while waiting for Incra to tell them which plot was theirs. But me, it hurt. On Dec. They built small huts, then started cutting out roads, knocking down trees everywhere they went.

Along the way they recruited topographers, lawyers, builders, and administrators, all of them eager to fill the vacuum left by the government—and grab a slice of public land for themselves. Ferreira Pinto was arrested twice for conflicts and invasions but was never convicted of a crime.

In the end, he estimates, his group settled some 1, families. Current law allows anyone who developed land as recently as to apply for amnesty. Everaldo Pandolfi is sitting on a brown horse at the intersection of two dirt roads, watching his son tend to cattle in a fenced-in lot.

Behind him is a plot he transferred to his daughter; to his left is a field owned by his other son. Combined, they add up to more than hectares.

From there he followed a familiar playbook: First he went for the majestic hardwoods, hundreds of years old and as much as 11 feet in diameter. They brought in fast cash from exporters. Then he torched the land to clear the scrub, before planting a weedy grass that is a staple in cattle diets. Eventually he built a small house, with two fish ponds and a pen for pigs out back. In a few more years, the burned tree stumps may break down enough to make way for the payday: coffee or soybeans.

In the south of the state, where big farmers reign, the shift to soybeans is already under way. But for that you need investment: irrigation, machinery, and fertilizer. The little guys rarely get there. Pandolfi has himself been fined three times, adding up to , reais. Blond and tan, Pandolfi is unassuming and a little bit goofy, curling his legs beneath him as he breaks down how he gets around the fines in order to sell his cattle to big beef producers, whose policies prohibit them from buying from deforesters.

It is fast approaching the point where I don't Erma Bombeck. Previous Next. Embedding this quote in your website. Style Oval Speech Border. Style Wild Strawberries. Style Pinched. Style Classic. Style Modern Green. Style SimpleFences. Other embedding Options. Citation If you are using this quote in any webpage , printmedia or any other places please use the following methods to cite this quotation.

Feb 21, I read somewhere that a man should tell the story of his life at the age of forty, and this deadline is fast approaching as I write these lines, only a few short weeks remain before this ominous birthday arrives. The Age of Northeast Asia is fast approaching. If you don't act, someone else will, and you run the risk of being marginalized from this opportunity space, - Author: Mark Raskino.

We are fast approaching a situation in which nobody will believe anything we [physicists] say in any matter that touches upon our self-interest. Nothing we do is likely to arrest our decline in numbers, support or social value. Only a crazy person wouldn't fear approaching a car with tinted windows during a late-night car stop, or pounding up a flight of stairs to execute a search warrant, or fast-roping from a helicopter down into hostile fire.

Real agents, like real people, feel that fear in the pit of their stomachs.