Word: braziller
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...There has also been a remarkable turnaround in Brazilian public opinion about the rain forest. In 1989, then President Jos? Sarney was defensive and defiant about criticism of Brazil?s failure to protect the Amazon; last June, by contrast, an outpouring of popular protest forced the Brazilian Congress to drop a plan to reduce from 80% to 50% the amount of forest to be set aside as nature preserves in future Amazonian development projects. Among the most vocal opponents of the rollback was Jos? Sarney Filho, the federal Environment Minister and son of the pro-development former President. In Acre...
...some nightmares threatening the rain forest have grown worse. While Brazil?s Congress has eliminated some subsidies that promoted indiscriminate cattle ranching and forest clearing and passed laws prohibiting new settlements in virgin forests, it has turned a blind eye to other forms of destruction. Politicians have encouraged some of the 10 million landless poor to migrate into the interior, torching forest as they go. Settlers persist in using fire to clear land for their subsistence farms because it is cheap and easy...
...blink of an eye. A single El Ni?o?inspired drought could do the trick if the road were paved and settlers had invaded. If this happens, scientists estimate that one burning season could destroy 100,000 sq km of forest, more than twice what was destroyed in all Brazil...
...virgin forest. ?incra dumps people in the forest and thinks they are finished with their responsibilities,? he says. Yet baranek still sees the road as inevitable, and a good thing. ?You can?t stop progress,? he says and shrugs, ?and it will connect Santar?m to the rest of Brazil...
...best friend of the forest may be social inertia. After more than three decades, Brazil?s vaunted Trans-Amazon Highway has yet to be completely paved, and other roads in the Amazon have been all but abandoned. The road that once linked Porto Velho and Manaus becomes impassable a mere two hours outside Porto Velho. Ecologist Nepstad argues that a more limited network of paved roads could give Santar?m all-weather access to the rest of Brazil, while forestalling incursions of unauthorized settlers from the south. The soybean exporters have already paved access to Amazon waterways through Porto Velho...