The vital ecosystem could also flip between rainforest and Savanna-like vegetation if drought deepens, the research finds.

The Amazon rainforest is approaching a tipping point which would have devastating consequences for the world’s climate system, new research shows.

Up to 47 per cent of ‘the planet’s lungs’ could be threatened by rising temperatures, droughts, deforestation and fires by 2050, according to scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact research (PIK) in Germany.

The southeastern Amazon in Brazil has already shifted from being a carbon sink to a carbon source, meaning it emits more of the greenhouse gas than it absorbs.

As PIK scientist Boris Sakschewski explains, that proves “the current amount of human pressure is too high for the region to maintain its status as a rainforest over the long term.”

Read more: euronews.com

Photo: euronews.com