Predominantly grown for animal feed, production of soybeans in Brazil has doubled the last 15 years, driven largely by the rising consumption of meat, as well as for use in food, biofuel and other products.
To meet this growth in demand, more and more land is being planted with soybeans and according to the report this expansion is often at the expense of habitats such as the Brazilian Cerrado.
This is a globally important savannah which is on its own responsible for 5% of the world’s biodiversity and which has been recently experiencing habitat destruction at a faster rate and on a similar scale to that in the Amazon.