Associated Press: Deforestation in the Amazon rain forest dropped 18% over the past 12 months, falling to the second-lowest level in a quarter century, Brazil's environment minister said on Wednesday.
Izabella Teixeira told participants at a news conference that 4 848 square kilometres of rain forest were destroyed between August 2013 and July 2014. That's a bit larger than the US state of Rhode Island.
The figures were down from 5 891 square kilometres razed during the same period a year earlier, in the wake...