Posted by Flipmemes has gathered that popular Social networking platform, Facebook has announced that it will begin clamping down on the illegal sale of protected areas of the Amazon rainforest on its site.
The social media giant changed its policy following several reports into the practice.The new measures will apply only to conservation areas and not to publicly owned forest.
And the move will just be subjected to the Amazon, not other rainforests and wildlife habitats across the world.According to a recent study from the think tank Ipam (Instituto de Pesquisa Ambental da Amazonia), a third of all deforestation happens in publicly-owned forests in the Amazon.Facebook said it would not reveal how it planned to find the illegal ads but said it would “seek to identify and block new listings” in protected areas of the Amazon rainforest.
Several plots of rainforest in the Amazon as large as 1,000 football pitches were being listed on Facebook’s classified ads service.
Many of the plots were inside protected areas, and land reserved to industrious use.Meetings were held between four sellers and an undercover operative posing as a lawyer claiming to represent wealthy investors.
One land-grabber, Alvim Souza Alves, was trying to sell a plot inside the Uru Eu Wau Wau indigenous reserve for about £16,400 in local currency.
Despite calls from indigenous leaders to do more, at the time Facebook said it was “ready to work with local authorities”, but would not take independent action to halt the trade.