{"id":11233,"date":"2020-10-07T09:29:47","date_gmt":"2020-10-07T06:29:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=11233"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:31:16","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:31:16","slug":"amazon-near-tipping-point-of-switching-from-rainforest-to-savannah-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2020\/10\/07\/amazon-near-tipping-point-of-switching-from-rainforest-to-savannah-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon Near Tipping Point of Switching from Rainforest to Savannah \u2013 Study"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Much of the Amazon could be on the verge of losing its distinct nature and switching from a closed canopy rainforest to an open savannah with far fewer trees as a result of the climate crisis, researchers have warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Rainforests are highly sensitive to changes in rainfall and moisture levels, and fires and prolonged droughts can result in areas losing trees and shifting to a savannah-like mix of woodland and grassland. In the Amazon, such changes were known to be possible but\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2019\/dec\/30\/environment-2050-flooded-cities-forced-migration-amazon-turning-savannah\">thought to be many decades away<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">New research shows that this\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2020\/mar\/10\/ecosystems-size-of-amazon-rainforest-can-collapse-within-decades\">tipping point<\/a>\u00a0could be much closer than previously thought. As much as 40% of the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2020\/aug\/10\/the-amazon-is-the-vagina-of-the-world-why-women-are-key-to-saving-brazils-forests-aoe\">existing Amazon rainforest<\/a>\u00a0is now at a point where it could exist as a savannah instead of as rainforest, according to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-020-18728-7\">a study published\u00a0in the\u00a0journal Nature Communications<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Any shift from rainforest to savannah would still take decades to take full effect, but once under way the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2020\/feb\/19\/ancient-fish-meals-chart-sahara-climate-shift-savannah-desert\">process is hard to reverse<\/a>. Rainforests support a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2019\/aug\/30\/amazon-fires-biodiversity-united-nations\">vastly greater range of species<\/a>\u00a0than savannah and play a much greater role in absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2020\/oct\/05\/amazon-near-tipping-point-of-switching-from-rainforest-to-savannah-study\">Read more&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Much of the Amazon could be on the verge of losing its distinct nature and switching from a closed canopy rainforest to an open savannah with far fewer trees as&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11234,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}