It’s dry season in Brazil, and once again, fires deliberately set by the factory farming industry are raging. Animals need our emergency help on the ground now.
These fires are tearing through pristine habitats in the Cerrado and Pantanal – a globally important biome. In 2020 alone, fires consumed a third of the Pantanal biome, killing 17 million animals.
As these animals are forced to flee, many have no choice but to cross busy roads as they try to escape. This is where we found Cecilia, a baby anteater, huddled beside her mother who had been killed by a passing car.
Cecilia is one of many baby anteaters orphaned because these devastating fires. Anteaters depend on forest shelter to help regulate their body temperature and are particularly vulnerable to the flames because of their fuzzy fur. Luckily, our partners at the Tamanduá Institute were able to rescue Cecilia and bring her to the ‘Órfãos do Fogo’– the Orphans of the Fire project.
This life-saving project was created to rehabilitate and return orphaned baby anteaters to the wild and give them a second chance. There, the anteaters are given the time and space they need to recover, all whilst being supported to explore their natural behaviours which will be crucial after their release.
The number of anteaters needing support is increasing every year as more and more land is cleared. This is only made worse by the dry season, which fuels these fires and makes them more intense and frequent than at any other time of year.
This is why we’re currently running an urgent appeal to help provide the surviving anteaters with the sanctuary, food, and care they need to recover. Any donation you make which make a huge difference to these vulnerable animals and give them a second chance at life.
But it’s not just the anteaters who are suffering. Iconic species like the jaguar, hyacinth macaw, giant otter are all under threat as the fires devastate their homes, alongside millions of other animals. Many have died, and any survivors will face significant loss of habitat and be suffering from injuries, hunger, and thirst.
This is creating an emergency on two levels. Raging bushfires present a severe and immediate threat to Brazil’s animals and habitats. The relentless expansion of the factory farming industry is causing this destruction as more and more land is cleared to grow crops to feed the animals in factory farms.
Animals need our emergency help on the ground to survive, but we also must work to expose the culprits behind this crisis.
World Animal Protection is calling for no new factory farms to be built to tackle the root cause of these fires, and protect the millions of wild animals suffering every year. Factory farming companies must start tracking the origin of the animal feed they purchase so that they can guarantee habitats aren’t being destroyed. They must also limit animal production to smaller numbers of farmed animals in high welfare, sustainable conditions with feed sourced locally and sustainably.
What can you do to help?
Our food system is broken.
The ever-growing demand for cheap meat is driving this immense suffering. In order to keep up with demand, more and more food to feed these animals is needed – quite literally adding fuel to the fire.
There are many ways in which you can help promote alternatives to factory farming, such as reducing your meat consumption. Eating less, and higher welfare meat, will decrease the demand for industrial farming practices that destroy habitats and put wildlife at risk. Check out our Say Yes to Less campaign here for top tips on how to cut down your meat consumption.
You can also help by donating to our urgent anteaters appeal, and provide on the ground, emergency, support to animals desperately in need.
Whatever you choose to do, your support is critical to not only helping care for animals affected by these fires, but also in preventing them from happening again and again.
Image credits: Hero image: Angelo Gandolfi/Alarmy Stock Photo | Body image 1: Tamanduá Institute | Body image 2: World Animal Protection / Noelly Castro
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