Saving the rainforest: At last, action on the Amazon

A new generation of state politicians in Brazil is tackling the destruction of the rainforest by creating a conservation area 10,000 square miles bigger than England. Steve Connor reports

Published: 04 December 2006

Good news does not often emerge from the Amazon rainforest, a part of the world that has become synonymous with man's rapacious desire to turn verdant wilderness into the greenery of dollar bills.

But that could change later today when a Brazilian politician announces the birth of the world's largest tract of tropical rainforest that is protected by law and policed by satellite.