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Amazon deforestation at record low, data shows
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jun/07/amazon-deforestation-illegal-logging-brazil?intcmp=122
Truck filled with ilegal wood in the vicinities of Anapu, Para, Brazil. In 2008, Brazil saw a record rate of deforestation in the Amazon - now it has fallen to its lowest level. Photograph: Paulo Fridman/Corbis
Deforestation of the Amazon has fallen to its lowest levels since records began, according to data recently released by Brazil's National Institute for Space Research.
The boost for the environment comes a week after president Dilma Rousseff was criticised for weakening the forest protection measures widely credited for the improvement, and two weeks before Brazil hosts the Rio+20 Earth summit.
Using satellite imagery, the institute said 6,418 sq km of Amazon forest was stripped in the 12 months before 31 July 2011 – the smallest area since annual measurements started in 1988.
