Declining Rio de la Plata Water Quality: Need to Mitigate the Environmental Impact of Deforestation, Cultivation, Invasive Species, Soil Erosion and Sedimentation

Río de la Plata is an estuary of the Paraná and Uruguay rivers and an intrusion of the Atlantic Ocean on the east coast of South America between Argentina and Uruguay. The Río de la Plata receives waters draining from one-fifth of the surface of the continent or a 3.2 million km2 basin that covers much of south-central South America. Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, is on the southwestern shore and Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, is located on the northern shore of the estuary. The primary objective is to mitigate the environmental impact of deforestation, cultivation, invasive species, soil erosion, and sedimentation on declining Rio de la Plata water quality. The current trajectory of increased environmental side effects of agricultural intensification in the Rio de la Plata region has increased food production per unit area of land. The decoupling of crop and livestock production systems, which have replaced previously established crop-pasture rotations and native grasslands. Ecological intensification based on multi-functional and diverse agricultural landscapes including integrated crop livestock systems is the way forward. This intensification pathway must be reconsidered.