forest. This discussion emphasizes the social and geographic background, the impact of deforestation on the Amazon's people and resources, and the causes as well as some proposed solutions of the problem.

The Amazon rain forest is so vast it can be seen from the space shuttle. Will this statement be true ten years from now? The logs that are taken from the rain forest are money for today and the wasteland of tomorrow. Virtually all tropical rain forests may vanish in the next twenty-five years. (Richter) With the extinction of the forest will come the extinction of much of the world's most remarkable wildlife. In an editorial statement, The Economist magazine noted that the Amazon rain forest in Brazil contains

. . . nearly one third of all the worlds' tropical forest-and a

greater variety of plants than any other country. The Amazon

has more types of fish than in all the rivers of Europe; the trees

are home to more species of birds than in all the forests of

North America. ("The Month Amazonian Burns" 15)

The resources of the Amazon do not stop with the trees and animal life, for the plant lif

Farmers may someday need to fall back on wild strains of food crops to resist epidemics of disease or insect infestations. Industries may come to the rain forest

With all it's diversity a tropical rain forest is one of worst places to grow crops. All the nutrients held in the decaying plants, at the forest floor, are recycled to the living trees, creating a lush forest of poor soils. Once the trees are gone, the topsoil is quickly and irreversible eroded, so that in just a few years hardly anything can grow, and both cattle raising and agriculture become nearly impossible. When the land gives out the farmers move on to slash and burn more

Whether Brazil likes it or not, the rest of the world has a legitimate

organisms. (White) To destroy any part of the forest aids in the extinction of the total Amazon area.

A North American plan sometimes called a "debt for nature swap" involves eradicating part of Brazil's debt to the first world countries in return for a percentage of Brazil's land. (House) Markets will be created for nuts, fruits, oils, pigments, and essences that can regularly be harvested. The profit off the land would be spent on environmental projects within Brazil. This plan may work

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2356
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)