Brazil’s Amazon Summit ends with a plan to protect the world’s rainforests, but no measurable goals

By FABIANO MAISONNAVE and DAVID BILLER
Associated Press

BELEM, Brazil (AP) — Brazil’s Amazon Summit has come to a close with a roadmap to protect tropical rainforests that has been welcomed as an important step in countering climate change. But it did not include any of the concrete commitments to end deforestation sought by some environmentalists. Leaders and ministers from eight Amazon nations signed a declaration Tuesday that laid out plans to drive economic development in their countries while preventing the Amazon’s ongoing demise “from reaching a point of no return.” Several environmental groups described the declaration as a compilation of good intentions with little in the way of measurable goals and timeframes.