The Last Forest: The Amazon in the Age of Globalization (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Brian Kelly (Author)
Key Phrases: international environmentalism, United States, The Last Forest, Mato Grosso (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The conventional wisdom is that the Amazon River basin and the unique flora and fauna of its fecund rainforests—half of the remaining forest on earth—are on the brink of ecological disaster. Not necessarily so, say the authors of this combination of wonkish policy paper, astute reporting and firsthand adventure narrative, who revisited Brazil's forested middle provinces 25 years after writing their first book, Amazon. Vast swaths of rainforest have indeed fallen to road development, cattle ranching, soy farming and clear-cut logging (including the decimation of mahogany trees). An estimated 3% of the forest was gone in 1980, when London and Kelly made two 100-day journeys through the Amazon. Now, 20% is gone. But there's still hope for "good things to happen," they say, as Brazil's 20-year-old democracy tries to balance economic growth with international environmental concerns. Leading sustainable rainforest development is Brazilian environment minister Marina Silva, who rose from unschooled peasant daughter of an impoverished rubber-plant tapper to win a Senate seat, then became "the most important person in the Amazon" after the 2002 election of Brazil's current president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. The portrait of her humble beginnings and thoughtful activism humanizes this fact-filled, sometimes dry book. (Feb. 6)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post

Reviewed by Candice Millard

When two young journalists, Mark London and Brian Kelly, traveled to Brazil in 1980 to write their first book about the Amazon, 3 percent of the rain forest had already been lost. When they returned 25 years later -- London now an attorney and Kelly the executive editor of U.S. News and World Report -- 20 percent was gone. The question that remains, and that lies at the heart of London and Kelly's thought-provoking new book, The Last Forest, is: Can the Amazon be saved? The authors' answer is one of confident optimism: "It is not too late." The solutions to deforestation, however, are nearly as complex as the rain forest itself.

"The rain forest, even to those who live in its shadow," London and Kelly note, "is an alien place." Millions of different species inhabit the Amazon, and each has evolved a unique and fascinating way to survive. There are caterpillars that scare off predators by making themselves look like vipers; four-eyed fish with two sets of corneas and retinas, one to search for danger above and the other to scan the river below; and plants that can change from a vine to a tree, depending on the sunlight. Trees of the same species are also widely separated in the Amazon, preventing a single disease from wiping out an entire species.

The same evolutionary adaptation that has protected trees from blight, however, has exposed them to overwhelming devastation at the hands of man. Because some types of wood are more valuable than others, it is not unusual for a logger to carve a road into the rain forest just to reach a single tree. "The scars left behind," London and Kelly write, "do not heal. These tiny trails are often visible from the air, their pattern resembling a river watershed in reverse. The end of the line is the tiny white vein that stops at the base of what was once a mahogany tree." This initial incursion into the rain forest sets off a seemingly irresistible surge of development. Smaller paths soon split off the central road, ending in farms or clearings for cattle. According to The Last Forest, 85 percent of deforestation occurs within 50 kilometers of a road. By some estimates, the Amazon will have lost a quarter of its original size by the year 2020.

Perhaps drastic circumstances call for drastic measures. Although the prevailing belief has long been that the only way to save the Amazon is to leave it wholly untouched, London and Kelly argue that that kind of absolutist thinking is not only outdated, it's dangerous. "Saving the Amazon," they write, "now requires saving the people who live in the Amazon." Their answer is a collaborative approach that joins preservation with its old nemesis: development. The government of Brazil, which encompasses more than half of the Amazon, has already taken a similar stance. "It's no good people saying the Amazon has to be the sanctuary of humanity and forget that there are 20 million people living there," said Brazil's president, Luiz Lula da Silva. Arguing that legal, monitored logging is preferable to the current chaos, his government recently announced a plan to auction off timber rights to vast stretches of the rain forest.

The Amazon, London and Kelly contend, is a land where "opportunities abound" and one that will allow for development -- if it's done well. We must recognize this region "not as an exotic wilderness but as one of the few frontiers left on earth," they write. To support their argument, they point to new anthropological evidence that may suggest that large societies -- with canals, bridges, curbed roads and thousands of people -- once existed in the Amazon Basin without destroying it. While the authors caution that "this discovery does not provide much hope, despite ongoing research, that twenty-first-century occupation will replicate this harmony," it does form part of the foundation for their optimism. The rest comes from their own research into the Amazon, which uncovered creative, if limited, solutions to deforestation. A chapter promisingly titled "A Way to Save the Amazon," discusses several of these initiatives: large-scale incentive programs that provide well-paying jobs for people who might otherwise turn to illegal logging; "certified" forests, in which trees are cut in rotation to protect species; and alternative uses of the land, from jute production to exotic fish farms.

By the authors' own admission, these solutions are imperfect, and none is a panacea. They are, however, examples of honest attempts to protect the Amazon by people who are determined to use it. In the end, striking that balance may offer the measure of hope that The Last Forest seeks to find.

Copyright 2007, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Random House; First Edition edition (February 6, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0679643052
• ISBN-13: 978-0679643050
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #340,837 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Amazonia in a nut shell, April 15, 2007

By	Sreeram Ramakrishnan (Yorktown Heights, NY) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

In a pithy, mostly engaging first-person account, the book provides an excellent synopsis of the various factors impacting Amazonia, especially Brazil, vis-a-vis economic and social development. The discussion is often framed within the context of protection of the environment and covers a gamut of issues - from political issues to impact of cattle. By largely using a first-person narrative, the book is able to provide a broad view of the different pertinent issues, though one cannot consider its treatment of any of the topics to be comprehensive. Regardless, the book is informative, provides an excellent background on previous research, and is for the most part annotated with excellent notes. One glaring disappointment is the lack of any photographs/plates in the book that could added impact to the narrations. The concluding chapter is fairly "decaf" with no real specific solutions cited to the problems raised. Perhaps thats the point of the book - the problems raised in the book is too complex to solve using traditional approaches. The struggles of a society (and state) as it "modernizes" is highlighted in an excellent manner using the various chapters which have a "stand-alone" feel to it. That lack of tight integration among the chapters adds to the broad view the book tries to paint. A good read.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fair and balanced assessment of the current state of affairs in the Amazon., March 7, 2007

By	Paul Tognetti "The real world is so much more... (Cranston, RI USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

More than a quarter century ago authors Mark London and Brian Kelly spent a considerable amount of time in the jungles of Brazil doing research for their 1983 book "Amazon". They wanted to meet the inhabitants of this strange and mysterious territory and discover for themselves just what was happening there. Now some 25 years later London and Kelly have returned to the Amazon to report on how this incredibly vast region and its people have fared during those intervening years. For all intents and purposes "The Last Forest" is a report card on the effectiveness of governmental policies at various levels and how wisely the land is being used by both the business community and the peoples who would call the Amazon home. "The Last Forest" is definitely not another doom and gloom book written by someone with an environmental ax to grind. Rather, this is a scholarly work that seeks to figure out which policies and approaches have been successful as well as those that may not have been. Mark London and Brian Kelly do yeoman work as reporters searching for the real story of the Amazon in 2007. I could detect no real political agendas here.
To most of the developed world the Amazon represents the last vast wilderness area on the planet. Environmentalists in both the United States and Europe are demanding that Brazil protect the rain forests from
significant development. But is this realistic? Those in both the public and private sectors in Brazil are quick to point out that neither the Europeans nor the Americans were willing to adhere to such stringent land use policies as their nations developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. For the most part, London and Kelly found that the Brazilian government is really quite sensitive to environmental issues but that they must balance these concerns with the sobering reality that their citizens need to put food on the table and must have jobs to go to. And when one stops to consider just how vast an area the Amazon is are you begin to appreciate how difficult it must be for any government agency to control what goes on there. In "The Last Forest" you will meet some of the leaders in various governmental entities who are charged with managing these complicated problems. You will also be introduced to a number of important business people who will detail the difficult issues they face in trying to make a go of it in such a vast and remote area. Then you will meet some of the ordinary folk and learn about the way they live. Some of these people live in extremely remote areas along the riverways while others struggle to survive in the congested cities. Finally, I would be remiss if I failed to mention the indispensible map of South America that is included at the beginning of this book. I found myself referring to it again and again! When all is said and done you will definitely have a much clearer understanding of this largely misunderstood region of the world.
"The Last Forest" is a thoroughly engaging and highly informative book. While most of us would love to see the jungles of the Amazon remain untouched for perpetuity deep down we know this is simply not possible. The best we can hope for is that all of the interested parties in the region act responsibly and in moderation. I found "The Last Forest" to be great way to get up to speed on these fascinating and complicated issues. Highly recommended!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GREAT ANALYSIS OF CURRENT SITUATION IN THE AMAZON, April 5, 2007

By	Denis Benchimol Minev "Amazonia" (Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil) - See all my reviews

Mark London and Brian Kelly come back to the Amazon after having written about it back in the 1980s. They find a very different world, where they find development alongside with poverty and environmental degradation. The book is centered upon understanding the different regions (states) within the Amazon and the differing dynamics within them. The book will not give definitive answers to the region's problems, but rather paint the picture and suggest directions in which we should move.

A main and important conclusion is the realization that the Amazon is not a pristine jungle without people, but rather that people are an integral part of it, and that any solution needs to take into account the widespread presence of population -- the concept of sustainable development needs to include good living standards for people within the forest. The book also points to some successes in preservation, such as the establishment of the Manaus Free Trade Zone as a means of attracting people away from the interior and providing good living standards.

The book flows from a history of the Amazon as a portuguese colony, to a Brazilian outpost to the center of the rubber world, to present day. A few key players are highlighted, such as Blairo Maggi (governor of Mato Grosso and the largest soy farmer in the world) and Eduardo Braga (governor of Amazonas and responsible for the reduction of deforestation by 53% in the largest Amazon state). It is also a travel book, highlighting the many different places and realities seen by the authors, from the wealthy shopping malls of Manaus to the poor slums of Altamira.

Highly recommend this book for anyone wanting to get a good image of the current status of development in the Amazon and hoping to understand the direction in which the region is moving.