Brazil deals with many natural hazards, but two main ones that stood out to me are the soil erosion, more specifically the sinkholes and then the tornadoes that they have to deal with. I am choosing to focus on these two, because they are the ones that impact Brazil more than any of the others and the ones that occur the most.

Soil erosion can be caused by many things, but in Brazil, it is mainly caused by the expansion of their agriculture. Between all the crop and livestock activity, the soil keeps eroding and causing issues for Brazil. A sinkhole is a surface depression or cavity in the ground by water erosion, which creates a route for surface water to go under the surface. The most recent sink hole that Brazil has experienced was in 2017, then in 2015, 2014, and 2010, and many more before that. Brazil is no stranger to sinkholes. Luckily in all of these, no one was hurt, but this is a major impact for Brazil. No one was hurt, however in a couple of them, houses and neighborhoods were swallowed up by these sinkholes (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2535133/Rio-slum-gets-swallowed-giant-sink-hole.html). And, some sinkholes are occurring in the middle of their farms, which I am sure they would rather have this happen in a farm than it happen in neighborhoods, but it still really affects them. Some of these sinkholes are huge, one was recorded at 65 feet wide and they are not sure how deep it is, but a 65-foot sinkhole can definitely do a lot of damage (https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2017/11/21/giant-hole-opened-farming-town-brazil/#63dc20a2a3e2). It is difficult to handle or even prevent sinkholes, because it is not like they can just stop planting their crops that are feeding everyone or stop raising their livestock. So, they must find a different way to try and fix this problem and prevent it from happening again. These sinkholes in Brazil are mainly occurring because of human activity, from their agriculture, their crops, their livestock, and even from the mining of its pure calcareous limestone rock (https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2017/11/21/giant-hole-opened-farming-town-brazil/#63dc20a2a3e2). I feel sinkholes are a priority because they happen often enough and are severe enough that they need to be talked about and they need to find a solution to at least help minimize the damage caused by sinkholes.

There is not much they can do. But, some recommendations I would have, to try and minimize the damage done by sinkholes would be to put in a national soil and water conservation policy so that they can stop eroding the soil and the soil can be preserved a lot longer than it is being preserved (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095633915300290). For the most part, sinkholes are pretty predictable. You can see the spots that get too much water and that are beginning to erode. If we start seeing patterns, build the buildings better and use better land-use practice, we may be able to start preventing sinkholes at least a little bit.

The second most dangerous hazard in Brazil are the tornadoes that they experience. Tornadoes usually occur due to the updrafts and downdrafts of a thunderstorm. These usually occur in the south or southeast portion of Brazil (https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/2011WCAS1095.1). In 2015, Brazil experienced a massive tornado which ruined over 500 homes, luckily only killing two people, but it ruined so many houses (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2015/04/22/deadly-tornado-destroys-parts-of-xanxere-city-in-brazil-video/?utm_term=.430b0176a461). I decided to focus on tornadoes also because they happen often, and they are definitely severe enough, to focus on them and try to see what they can do for this.

Again, there is not much that they can do about this, but they can put in an alarm system that goes to the people’s phones, or over radio, just something that can tell them that a tornado is about to occur and that they need to get into cover. And also, just being prepared could really help them. If they know what to do when a tornado really helps them, it would be so helpful.

I would definitely target the south and southeast first, because tornadoes and sinkholes both occur in this area and they are definitely the worst hazards that brazil faces. And if I was constructing a house in Brazil, I would build my house in the Northwest portion of Brazil, because hardly any hazards that Brazil faces occur in the Northwest part of the country.