Amazon Deforestation Jumps as Soy and Cattle Push Inland

SAO PAULO - Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon accelerated sharply over the past year, satellite data show, as high prices for soy and beef push ranchers and farmers deeper into the world's largest rainforest.

Brazil's space agency reported a steep increase in clearing for the twelve months ending in July — a reversal after three years of decline that the government had credited to its enforcement crackdown.

The spike cost Brazil's environment minister her job in May. Marina Silva, a childhood rubber-tapper and national hero, resigned saying she lacked the political backing to fight the agricultural lobby.

The Amazon remains vast — larger than Western Europe — but scientists say roughly a fifth of the original forest is gone, and some warn of a tipping point beyond which the forest would begin to dry and collapse on itself.

The destruction matters far beyond Brazil: the forest stores an estimated 90 billion tons of carbon, and burning it accounts for a large share of Brazil's greenhouse-gas emissions, making the country one of the world's top emitters.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has promised new enforcement while defending development of the impoverished region. "The Amazon is not being deforested by Brazilians' hunger alone," he said. "It is being deforested by the world's appetite."

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Associated Press writers contributed to this report.

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