Amazon rainforest reaches the area and so the lower the yield per hectare becomes. So despite the popular perception, there has been no economical advantage for Brazil from logging rainforest zones and converting these to pastoral fields. The needs of soy farmers have been used to justify many of the controversial transportation projects that are currently developing in the Amazon. The first two highways successfully opened up the rainforest and led to increased settlement and deforestation. The mean annual deforestation rate from 2000 to 2005 ( per year) was 18% higher than in the previous five years ( per year). Although deforestation
Deforestation of the Amazon rainforest In the pre-Columbian era, parts of the Amazon Rainforest were a densely populated open agriculture. After the European colonization in the 16th century, with the hunt for gold, Western diseases, slavery and later the rubber boom, the Amazon Rainforest was depopulated and the forest grew larger. Prior to 1974s, access to the forest's largely roadless interior was difficult, and aside from partial clearing along rivers the forest remained intact. Deforestation accelerated greatly following the opening of highways deep into the forest, such as the Trans-Amazonian highway in 1972. In parts of the Amazon, the poor soil made plantation-based agriculture unprofitable.