The New York Times Elisabeth Rosenthal tells of the efforts to reduce deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon by paying landowners to preserve forests. Worth a read as it talks about how Brazil is trying to balance development and conservation, a key issue for biofuels producers.

Deforestation, a critical contributor to climate change, effectively accounts for 20 percent of the worlds carbon dioxide emissions and 70 percent of the emissions in Brazil. Halting new deforestation, experts say, is as powerful a way to combat warming as closing the worlds coal plants, the article says