Plantation forestry would be aected by climatic
change, both from global warming and
from other processes such as the reduction of
evapotranspiration that results from converting
Amazonian forests to cattle pasture. Most climatic
changes would have negative impacts on
plantation yields, thereby forcing the country to
maintain larger areas of silviculture to supply the
same ¯ows of forest products (and substantially
diminishing the pro®tability of doing so).
Nevertheless, Brazil's abundant land resources
place it in a privileged position in absorbing the
costs imposed by climatic change, as well as in
responding to the opportunities oered by proposed
countermeasures in the plantation forestry
sector (Fig. 1).