The report "Hamburger connection Fuels Amazon Destruction," was released to coincide with the Government of Brazil's annual announcement of the rate of deforestation in the Amazonian jungle.

As the title suggests, the report made no bones about the role of cattle farming in causing deforestation in the Amazon. It predicted that in the 12 months to the middle of 2003 the loss of Amazonian forest in Brazil would be similar to the 2.5 million hectares lost during the previous reporting period. As it turned out, the Brazilian government's Space Research Institute (INPE) announced the official deforestation rate for 2003 was 2,375,000 hectares, only slightly less than CIFOR's estimate.

Conducted over several years by CIFOR's Sven Wunder, Benoit Mertens, Pablo Pacheco and David Kaimowitz, the report strongly argues that the recent and rapid increase in the worldwide demand for Brazilian beef has been the major factor in the cutting down of the Amazon forest to clear land for cattle grazing.

"This research provides the first substantial data to support recent speculation about the role international demand for Brazilian beef is playing in Brazil's skyrocketing deforestation rate. There are several reasons for this increase in demand, ranging from the devaluation of the Brazilian currency, concerns about importing beef from countries afflicted by mad cow disease and, possibly, fears of avian flu, which may have led the public to choose beef over chicken," said Kaimowitz. "This may be good for Brazil's beef industry, but it is making mincemeat of the Amazon rainforests."

Between 1990 and 2001 the percentage of Europe's processed meat imports that came from Brazil rose from 40 to 74 percent. Markets in Russia and the Middle East are also responsible for much of this new demand for Brazilian beef. As recently as 1995, Brazil exported less than US$500 million dollars of beef. By 2003, only eight years later, Brazil was exporting three times as much, US$1.5 billion dollars, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Between 1997 and 2003, the volume of exports increased more than fivefold, from 232,000 to nearly 1.2 million metric tons in Carcass Weight Equivalent. Meanwhile, domestic beef consumption, which for decades has been responsible for the sector's expansion, developed slowly. For the first time ever, the growth in Brazilian cattle production - 80 percent of which was in the Amazon - is largely export driven.

The total area of forest lost in the Amazon rose from 41.5 million hectares in 1990 to 58.7 million hectares in 2000. In just ten years, the region lost an area of forest twice the size of Portugal, most of it becoming pasture.

"Although the last few years have witnessed a great deal of justifiable concern about the expansion of soybean cultivation into the Amazon, that still explains only a small percentage of total deforestation," according to Pacheco. He also notes that logging contributes indirectly to deforestation, but is "much less important than the growth of cattle ranching."

On March 15, Brazil's President Luis Inácio (Lula) da Silva announced a major new "Action Plan to Prevent and Control Deforestation in the Legal Amazon." The US$135 million plan focuses on activities to reduce deforestation, including better land use planning, greater enforcement of laws regarding deforestation and the illegal occupation of government lands, improved monitoring of deforestation, more detailed reviews of public infrastructure investments, greater support for indigenous territories and community forestry, increased support for sustainable agriculture, and greater control over credit for ranchers.

"The government's approach goes in the right direction, but unless urgent action is taken, the Brazilian Amazon could lose an additional area the size of Denmark over the next 18 months," said Benoit Mertens, one of the authors of the report working with CIFOR and the Forest Department at CIRAD (the French Agricultural Research Center for International Development).

"The market forces promoting the Amazon's cattle-driven deforestation are enormous and while the newly announced strategy is to be commended, CIFOR feels there are ways to enhance the effectiveness of these measures."