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Non-Tech : The Brazil Board -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Cogito Ergo Sum who wrote (697)	1/17/2012 10:24:51 AM
From: elmatador	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2517

Cerrado is a region with soil that needs correction. The group Agrirocha has been researching using surface rock/soil that can be used to correct poor soils. In a similar manner as acid soil can be corrected with limestone. Carrado Agriculture The cerrado was thought worthless for agriculture until researchers at Brazil’s agricultural and livestock research agency, Embrapa, discovered that it could be made fertile by appropriate additions of phosphorus and lime. Researchers also developed tropical varieties of soybeans, until then a temperate crop. [25] Today the "cerrado" region contributes more than 70% of the beef cattle production in the country ("Pecuária de Corte no Brasil Central"; Beef Cattle Production in Central Brazil, Corrêa, 1989), and thanks to irrigation and soil correcting techniques it is also an important production centre of grains, mainly soya, beans, maize and rice. Great extensions of "cerrado" are also utilised in the production of cellulose pulp for the paper industry, with the cultivation of several species of Eucalyptus and Pinus, but still as a secondary activity. Coffee produced in the Cerrado is now an important export. [26] The region is increasingly threatened by single-crop monoculture plantations (particularly soybeans), the expansion of agriculture in general, and the burning of the vegetation for charcoal. Current knowledge on changes in carbon stocks upon land use conversion in the Brazilian Cerrado have been reviewed by Battle-Bayer et al. [27] Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Borlaug described the Cerrado as one of Earth's last remaining arable frontiers for the expansion of agriculture. [28] The 2006 World Food Prize was awarded to former Brazilian Minister of Agriculture Alysson Paolinelli, soil scientist Edson Lobato (also of Brazil), and American soil scientist A. Colin McClung for their leadership in soil science and policy implementation that opened the Cerrado to agricultural and food production. [29] In total, 37.3% of the Cerrado has already been totally converted to human use, while an additional 41.4% is used for pasture and charcoal production. The gallery forests in the region have been among the most heavily affected. It is estimated that about 432,814 km2, or 21.3% of the original vegetation, remains intact today. [30]