London (CNN) -- Brazil stands at a crossroads in its efforts to
preserve the Amazon rainforest as the government considers
controversial legislation governing land use. For most of the
past decade, it has made a dramatic reduction in the rate of
deforestation, providing a model of how it could be tackled in
other rainforest areas such as Indonesia and Congo. The Amazon
rainforest covers a huge area, roughly half as large as the
United States, with about 60% of it in Brazil. It is estimated
that nearly a fifth of the Brazilian forest has been lost since
1970; figures from Brazil's space research institute, INPE, show
that 4.1 million square kilometers (1.58 million square miles)
of Brazilian forest were still standing in 1970, compared with
3.35 million square kilometers (1.29 million square miles)
today. Like in many developing nations, there is pressure on the
natural environment from commercial and agriculture interests.
According to INPE, in 1995, nearly 30,000 square kilometers
(about 11,550 square miles)