This is a new world report with Professor Evan Ellis of the US Army Award College Strategic Studies Institute. I'm John Bachelor.

South Palo, within hours. Scientists agree that preserving the Amazon rainforest

is vital. That's inarguable. It breeds for the planet.

However, nearly 40% of the areas of the Amazon rainforest critical to curbing climate

have not been granted special government protection as either nature or

indigenous reserves. Professor, the Amazon's been in the news for years I'm never

certain what the alarming headlines mean because they come from

NGOs who are disposed to emphasize the negative and at the same time the Brazilian

government which which which selects different directions every four

years every two years is aware of the Amazon's criticality and does not seem to be able to make profound changes.

There are fires, there's droughts, cyclical stuff.

The drought, for example, is on now.

Is the Amazon something that can be protected or is it just a permanent headline in climate change?

Well, as you point at John, there is a enormous importance not only for Brazilians but for really the global

community in general of protecting it precisely for the reasons that you point

out the functions that it has in through its vegetation absorbing carbon and producing oxygen.

The lung of the world is people often say.

But what we've also seen is a combination of two reinforcing effects.

The factors that are systematically destroying the Amazon

and the factors that are produced by climate change.

And the Amazon's destruction has a little bit

to do with that climate change, but it's certainly not

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