Amazon Rainforest Deforestation

December 4th, 2007

The Amazon Rainforest, composing of 5.5 million acres, is located in the heart of South America. More than half of Earth’s remaining rainforests are located in the Amazon. This area of the world has the richest diversity among plants and animals.

The need to keep the Amazon Rainforest from deforestation is immense. From 1991 to 2000 the area of lost rainforest rose to 587,000 km² which is twice the size of Portugal. Most of this barren land is now used to pasture cattle.

The annual rate of deforestation in the Amazon Rainforest continues to increase yearly. Livestock pasture and the production of crops are the main two reasons for tearing down the tropical rainforests. South Americans value land that has been deforested to be 5-10 times more profitable than when it was a rainforest.

Due the lack of understanding of the full composition of our tropical rainforests, scientists are consistently racing against time to fully understand what value our rainforests hold. There may be cures for cancer and cures for AIDs among many other diseases with no current cure located in the wildlife of our world’s rainforests.

At current estimates, roughly over 80% of the Amazon Rainforest is still intact. Visit Adventure-life.com to see the things you can do to help reduce deforestation of the world’s largest rainforest.

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