Climate Change and Sustainable Development: The case of Amazonia and Policy Implications

Abstract

The relationship between sustainable development and climate change has been extensively addressed, but with few studies focusing on the Amazonian Rainforest. This is, by far, the largest rain forest in the world and one of the most pressured by devastation resulting from economic activities. The combination of the inhabitants’ welbeing and the preservation of the Amazonian region is a challenge not only to local and national governments but also to the world. Due to its dimension, its preservation is critical and the problem of climate change associated with rising temperatures, lower precipitation, and the increase of extreme weather events must be mitigated. This paper aims to study the effects of climate change on the sustainable development of Amazonia. To reach this objective a scientometric analysis was carried out based on a sample of 2,598 articles. The sample’ articles reveals the evolution of the research field in terms of the increased number of works that have been published in top journals and the main drivers of climate change in Amazonia, such as deforestation, global warming, and land use. Our results indicate also that the environmental dimension of sustainable development has been the more studied. From the analysis it is recommended that policy makers implement incentives for a better forest management, design policies with realistic expectations, and rely more on technical reports and approaches to implement policies. Moreover, better integration of policies at local, regional, national and international levels is necessary to adaptation and mitigation of climate change. A set of measures to intensify the scientific approaches integrating economic and social dimensions are also proposed. This work contributes to the systematization of the literature on sustainable development and climate change in Amazonia which has not been done yet, providing also policies’ recommendations to researchers and professionals for a better understanding of climate change and sustainable development in the Amazonia region of Brazil.