The Amazon rainforest is an ecosystem that holds an extremely diverse array of plants and animals. It is located in the northern and central portion of South America, mainly in Brazil. It took thousands of years for it to become the way it is, and it stood peacefully up until last century. People began cutting it down for the economical advancement of their country, many people are still unaware of the impact this will cause. Some of the reasons deforestation occurs are population growth and logging. These reasons benefit Brazil’s economy, unfortunately they are in turn devastating the earth’s environment. We must stop deforestation; the rainforest is home to millions of creatures and it acts like a filter for the entire planet.

The biggest issue concerning deforestation in Brazil and the Amazon is an economic one. When an economically struggling country has a choice between logging a forest to sell timber for high profits and leaving the forest intact without monetary compensation, the nation usually chooses the profitable alternative. This is because immediate economic gains are more important than future environmental costs (Miller, 1987, 59). Brazilians believe tha

As part of the national interest, Brazilian government shrunk the Amazon rainforest between the 1960s and 1990s. Brazil was trying to solve problems of overpopulation, landlessness, and poverty in the country’s crowded coastal region by moving people in their border regions. By doing this, they also created the so-called safety valves, populated buffer zones taking off the pressure on their vulnerable borders. The Brazilian government saw the thinly inhabited Amazon as an invitation for foreign invaders and, by moving the people, this thread was not eliminated but its constant threat was greatly downgraded. In order to get more people in these regions, the authorities gave ownership of the land to newcomers, if they would simply clear the trees on it. The government also built roads and schools to attract even more people for their “the land without people to the people without land campaign” (Rotnem, 1998, 27).

In addition to that there is the biodiversity issue. Researcher Howard Facklam states, "It was estimated at one point in the 1980s that such forest lands were being cleared at the rate of 50 acres a minute; another estimate put the rate at more than 200,000 sq km (more than 78,000 sq mi) a year. In 1993, satellite data provided the rate of deforestation could result in the extinction of as many as 750,000 species, which would mean the loss of a multiplicity of products: food, fibers, medical drugs, dyes, gums, and resins" (Facklam, 1990, 53). So what kind of condition will the forests be in the year 2050? If this rate of deforestation continues, there will be no tropical rain forest in the year 2050. Therefore, preservation needs to occur now in order stop the terrible loss of the rain forests and all that it can provide. Some help can come from proper harvesting methods, Instead of clear-cutting (removal of all trees), selection cutting (removal of selected mature trees) could be done, and reforestation, either naturally from seed trees or artificially by planting, would help. The rate and frequency of any cutting should aim for sustained production over an indefinite period. Another principle of conservation is complete use of all trees harvested. Technological advances, such as particleboard and gluing, have created such uses for branches, defective logs, trees too small to be milled into boards, and so-called inferior trees (Cappon, 1990, 89).

A loss of biodiversity will start to be noticeable within this century. Where an acre of woodland in the northeastern United States might include a dozen different kinds of trees, a typical acre of rainforest may have as many as 300 (Hornaday, 1993, 29). Many species are in danger as well. Even though scientists can not pinpoint exactly how many species roam the Earth, the Global BioDiversity Assessment, a UN-sponsored report in which about 1000 scientists have had a hand, gives a good working estimation of between 13 and 14 million species. Of that number, only about 1.75 million have been scientifically described. They suspect that the number of species in tropical rainforests will fall by 5-10% ov

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