Brazil's Amazon boom pits economic growth versus forest (BBC)
By Sarah Grainger
BBC News, Manaus
Marcelo Gordo is standing in the back garden of a small house in a suburb of Manaus, the capital of Brazil's Amazonas state, hoping to catch sight of a pied tamarin.
These small primates, with white upper bodies and brown bottoms, live only in rainforest surrounding the city and as Manaus grows and expands, they are becoming trapped in isolated patches of forest.
Mr Gordo, a researcher from the Federal University of Amazonas, has been studying these creatures for some 14 years.
He has pinpointed a group of about eight which live in a jungle-covered gully behind this row of houses.
"They have a very strict geographical distribution and in the last few years they've been losing this space," he says.
"If these animals had a very small geographic distribution in a different place, where they weren't competing with humans, there wouldn't be a problem, but they live right where Manaus is."
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more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-17609842
The basic problem here is that this city was deliberately built in the middle of the rain forest -- as it grows, the pressure to build roads, bridges, railroads, suburbs, etc. further into the wilderness becomes irresistible.
