Most of the fire that burns the Pantanal originated in private properties, and almost no fire has indications of having started by natural causes, such as lightning. This is pointed out by satellite monitoring of the biome, from different institutions. For researchers, human action is the main vector of the burns, which could become one of the biggest crises ever seen in the Pantanal. Almost 95% of the 3,372 fire outbreaks in the first half of 2024—a record number for the period—are in private areas, according to the BDQueimadas program of Inpe (National Institute for Space Research), considering data up to this Tuesday (25).

The focus indicates the ignition location of a fire, where it starts. Only 189 of them were registered in indigenous lands (TIs) and conservation units (UCs), state or federal. June of this year is already the month with the most fire outbreaks in the entire historical series of Inpe, which has been monitoring this since 1998.

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