The Amazon regulates weather across South America, stores carbon, and preserves biodiversity. However, unsustainable development practices worsen climate impacts, while policy gaps leave marginalized groups unsupported.
The recent extreme drought in the Amazon was a preview of our climate emergency future if we fail to act decisively. Climate change made Amazon 30 times more likely, turning it into a 1-in-50-year agricultural crisis. Smallholder farmers and Indigenous communities, already vulnerable, were hit hardest. Events like this could strike every 10-15 years by 2050 without rapid emissions reductions. The trends are clear – climate change drives more devastating droughts and floods by altering ocean and atmospheric patterns.
Wetter wet and drier dry seasons may be in store for the Amazon Basin in the final 30 years of this century. Computer modelling suggests annual maximum flows will increase up to 50% in the Amazon River’s headwaters in the Andes to the west; meanwhile, annual minimum flows will decline by 20% to 50% throughout most of the region.
We cannot stand by while the Amazon burns, dries, and dies before us. This biome is the beating heart of South America, pumping rains across the continent. It holds 10% of the planet’s biodiversity and helps regulate our global climate. We are all downstream.
#ClimateAction #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #Drought #AmazonDrought #AmazonFires #ClimateJustice #Adaptation #Resilience #IndigenousRights; Green Climate Fund
Bapon (SHM) Fakhruddin, PhD
Water and Climate Leader| Strategic Investment Partnerships and Co-Investments| Professor| EW4ALL| Board Member| Chair- CODATA TG| Award Winner (SDG 2021, EWS 2025)
The Amazon on the Brink: Urgent Climate Action Needed to Protect South America’s Lifeline
Bapon (SHM) Fakhruddin, PhD 