Dec. 23 (UPI) -- Organized crime and illicit economies emerged in 2025 as major drivers worsening deforestation across the Amazon, despite partial gains in environmental enforcement in some countries in the region.
Recent reports by environmental groups and regional research centers say illegal gold mining, indiscriminate logging, drug trafficking and irregular expansion of cattle ranching are causing large-scale forest loss and progressive landscape degradation.
These activities also facilitate money laundering and the convergence of illicit, informal and formal economies, particularly in remote areas with weak state presence.
Roughly the size of the United States, the Amazon spans nine Latin American countries: Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, French Guiana, Guyana and Suriname. About 60% lies in Brazil, followed by Peru with 9.9%, Colombia with 6.7% and Venezuela with 6.3%.
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A report by the Fundación para la Conservación y el Desarrollo Sostenible and the Instituto Igarapé found at least 17 armed groups operating across 69% of the northwestern Amazon, the region with the highest number of socioenvironmental conflicts worldwide.
Groups cited include Comando Vermelho in Brazil, the National Liberation Army in Colombia, Los Choneros in Ecuador and Tren de Aragua in Venezuela.
The report warns that forest loss no longer reflects only local or subsistence dynamics, but is increasingly driven by criminal networks that control land, resources and routes, using deforestation to consolidate territorial and economic power across large swaths of the Amazon biome.
For gold mining, the report identified 4,472 illegal mining sites across the Amazon, with a heavy concentration in Venezuela, which hosts 32% of those enclaves despite accounting for just 5.6% of Amazon territory. Brazil recorded 2,576 sites, 95% of which remain active.
The operations are linked to mercury pollution of waterways, river destruction and illegal occupation of Indigenous lands, particularly in remote and border areas.
A study by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development highlighted the impact of gold mining in Peru's Amazon region of Madre de Dios, where the activity can explain about one-third of regional deforestation, with districts where mining covers more than 10% of the land area.
At the national level, however, forest conversion to mining accounts for just 2% of Peru's net tree cover loss since 1985, underscoring a highly concentrated but severe local impact.
According to the Monitoring of the Amazon Andes Program, gold mining in Peru's Amazon has expanded sharply in recent years, closely tracking international gold prices.
Record prices per ounce in 2025 spurred new deforestation fronts across nine regions and the invasion of waterways for mining activity. By mid-2025, mining-related deforestation exceeded 139,000 hectares, with Madre de Dios accounting for 97.5% of the total.
The OECD also found a statistically significant relationship between the new presence of coca cultivation and increased deforestation in some Peruvian Amazon districts, as well as a similar link with the emergence of illegal or irregular logging based on official alerts.
Coca crops were present in 148 districts and suspected illegal logging in 48 districts, pointing to the broad territorial reach of activities tied to criminal networks.
The FCDS and Instituto Igarapé report further argues that Amazon deforestation is not primarily driven by small farmers or local communities but by large landholders and companies operating amid weak state oversight.
These actors use land grabbing, irregular occupation of public areas and ostensibly legal activities such as ranching and mining to expand the extractive frontier and consolidate control over vast territories.
The pattern reveals a gray zone between legal and illegal activity in which revenues from illicit economies can be laundered through formal supply chains.
Converting forest into pasture or mining fronts not only facilitates land appropriation but also concentrates economic and territorial power, displacing Indigenous communities and weakening governance mechanisms that have historically helped protect the forest.
The violence linked to these dynamics has made the Amazon the world's deadliest region for environmental defenders, accounting for 66% of all such killings globally in 2023, the report said.
An analysis by Amazon Watch and the Coordinadora de las Organizaciones Indígenas de la Cuenca Amazónica said deforestation tied to illegal activity is undermining the forest's ability to recover and maintain its climate functions.
The damage is compounded by intentional fires used to clear and occupy land, while gold mining adds lasting degradation through mercury contamination of rivers and soils that extends beyond mined areas.
If these pressures persist, the report warned, the Amazon could cease acting as a carbon sink and become a net source of emissions, with direct consequences for the global climate.
In a summary released by the Red Amazónica de Información Socioambiental Georreferenciada, more than 217.4 million acres -- an area larger than the entire state of Texas -- were deforested across the Amazon between 1985 and 2023, along with sharp increases in land use for mining, up 1,063%, agriculture, up 598%, and cattle ranching, up 298%.
Amid the bleak outlook, two positive developments emerged.
Brazil's space agency, the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais, said data from its PRODES system showed Amazon deforestation fell 11% in 2025, the lowest area in 11 years and the third smallest on record.
Most of the forest loss detected this year fell under what authorities classify as progressive degradation, including selective logging and burning.
In Colombia, the Instituto de Hidrología, Meteorología y Estudios Ambientales reported declines in early deforestation alerts in the Colombian Amazon compared with 2024. Forest loss in the first quarter fell to 27,052 hectares, down 33% from a year earlier, while alerts in the second quarter dropped 16% year over year.
These figures are positive considering that nationwide deforestation in Colombia surged in key areas such as the Amazon, where forest loss rose 74% in 2024, with more than double the number of acres lost compared with 2023.