We rely on rainforests in ways that we are only just beginning to understand. We do know that rainforests play a significant role in maintaining weather patterns and the Earth's limited supply of fresh water. We also know that natural elements and species from the rainforest are the basis of countless consumer, agricultural, medical, and industrial products. Although rainforests cover less than 2% of the Earth's surface, they are home to more than half of all plant and animal species.

According to The Nature Conservancy, originally, 8 million square miles of tropical rain forest encircled the planet. More than half has been burned, bulldozed and obliterated. Now, only 3.4 million square miles remain. If deforestation continues at current rates, scientists estimate that nearly all tropical rainforest ecosystems will be destroyed by the year 2030.

* At least 42 million acres of tropical forest are lost each year, an area the size of Washington State.

* An estimated 50,000 species of plants and animals, mostly plants and invertebrates and mostly in the tropics, are condemned to extinction every year, an average of about 140 a day.

* Since the turn of the century, 90 tribes of indigenous peoples have been wiped out in Brazil alone.

* Logging is the principal threat to the tropical rainforests of Cameroon, Congo and Gabon. It is estimated that every year 137,000 hectares are logged in these three countries alone.

* Some reasons that rainforests are being destroyed: for wood [paper] and oil exploration. However, cattle ranching, mining,road-building, farming, and hydro-electric dams also threaten the existence of rainforests.

* Rainforests are disappearing at the rate of about eighty acres every minute