The Amazon rainforest, also called Amazon jungle or Amazonia, is a moist broadleaf tropical rainforest in the Amazon biome that covers most of the Amazon basin of South America.
The majority of the forest, 60%, is in Brazil, followed by Peru with 13%, Colombia with 10%, and with minor amounts in Bolivia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Suriname, and Venezuela.
The rainforest likely formed during the Eocene era (from 56 million years to 33.9 million years ago). It appeared following a global reduction of tropical temperatures when the Atlantic Ocean had widened sufficiently to provide a warm, moist climate to the Amazon basin.
Amazon forest is estimated to produce, through photosynthesis, 20 per cent of the total oxygen in the earth’s atmosphere. Hence it is called the ‘lungs of the planet’ and harboring probably millions of species.
The largely tropical Amazonian rain forest in South America has the greatest biodiversity on earth- it is home to more than 40,000 species of plants, 3,000 of fishes, 1,300 of birds, 427 of mammals, 427 of amphibians, 378 of reptiles and of more than 1,25,000 invertebrates.
Scientists estimate that in these rain forests there might be at least two million insect species waiting to be discovered and named.
Amazon rain forest is being cut and cleared for cultivating soya beans or for conversion to grasslands for raising beef cattle.
The biodiversity in the Amazon is becoming increasingly threatened, primarily by habitat loss from deforestation as well as increased frequency of fires. Over 90% of Amazonian plant and vertebrate species (13,000–14,000 in total) may have been impacted to some degree by fires.
Deforestation in the Amazon rainforest region has a negative impact on local climate. It was one of the main causes of the severe drought of 2014–2015 in Brazil. This is because the moisture from the forests is important to the rainfall in Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. Half of the rainfall in the Amazon area is produced by the forests.
Name: Mukesh Verma
Department: Botany NEET
Narayana Jaipur Center (NIHQ)