World Bank gives Brazil cash to stop logging

The World Bank has approved a $1.3 billion loan to assist Brazil in cutting deforestation in the Amazon basin and increase sources of renewable energy.

The loan will be made available in two parts, the second $500 million tranche being made available after reaching targets for Brazil that merge environmental improvements with speedier growth in the economy, the World Bank said.

A third of the planet’s tropical rain forests are in Brazil and it has the largest stock of fresh water.

Brazil has long fought to reduce continuous deforestation in the rain forest and in Pantanal, the largest wetlands on earth.

Deforestation increased in 2008, the first time for four years.

Higher prices for soybeans and cattle tempted illegal loggers further into the rainforest.

Last year Carlos Minc, Environment Minister, opened a strategy to cut deforestation by 70 percent in nine years.

This goal is in Brazil’s embracing climate-change plan funded by the World Bank.

Some Brazilian environmentalists are against the loan, believing the government will use the money for major infrastructure projects in the Amazon.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s government has supported some large dams in the area.

Some claim these dams will flood sensitive bionetworks and encourage loggers on newly built roads.

A further loan is likely to be agreed in the fourth quarter of next year.