The battle for the Amazon rainforest is a daunting task. It's a long battle between miners, loggers, and developers against those who see the need to protect and save this crutial enviornment. The destruction affects lives, families, the economy, politics, and the environment amongst other things. The effects of the Amazon affects the entire world. Possible vaccines, medicine, animals and beautiful wildlife are all at risk. .
The environmental problems of today started a long time ago, before automobiles, electricity, and the Industrial Revolution. As population increased along with technology advances, more significant and widespread problems arose. The Amazon rainforest was not spared from this growth. The Amazon region has long been seen as a land of great riches. "Early Europeans and others have long been fascinated by the Amazon, with early visions of a land of gold, the legend of "El Dorado"" (Faminow 32). The European invasion bought with it the increased population and new technologies that had a drastic effect to the Amazonian region, which was once considered safe from exploitation. This problem has continued to the present, with higher consequences. Ehrlich explains, "today, unprecedented demands on the environment from a rapidly expanding human population and from advancing technology are causing a continuing and accelerated decline in the quality of the environment and it's ability to sustain life" (98). As a result, the Amazon rainforest is being destroyed at an alarming rate, affecting all those that live in the region, and around the world.
To help in the understanding of the vast changes in the rainforest, Howard Facklam has come up with some staggering statistics. He states, "it was estimated at one point in the 1980's that the Amazon basin was being cleared at the rate of 50 acres a minute; another estimate put the rate at 78,000 square miles per year" (53).