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<font size="3">Focused on a region many have never heard about, The Nature Conservancy recently launched the “Plant a Billion Trees Campaign at www.plantabillion.org to plant a billion trees by 2015 in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest, one of the greatest repositories of biodiversity on Earth.</font>

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<font size="3">The forest was once the twice the size of Texas, spanning eastern Brazil, northern Argentina and eastern Paraguay. </font>

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<font size="3">But today, more than 93 percent of the forest has been cleared to make way for 130 million humans, 70 percent of Brazil’s population. </font>

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<font size="3">“No tropical forest on Earth has come closer to total destruction than Brazil’s Atlantic Forest,” said Stephanie Meeks, acting president and CEO of the conservancy. “Now we have a real chance to bring this region back from the brink.” </font>

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<font size="3">The remaining 7 percent is highly fragmented, but still harbors one of the greatest repositories of biodiversity on Earth. </font>

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<font size="3">Just a small fraction of the size of the great Amazon rainforest, the Atlantic Forest is home to 1,180 species of mammals, amphibians, reptiles, fish and birds, representing 5 percent of the vertebrates on Earth. </font>

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<font size="3">More than 800 of those species are unique to the Atlantic Forest, and more than 60 percent of all of Brazil’s threatened animals call this forest home.</font>

 

 

 

 

• Brazil
• forest
• reforestation
• biodiversity