Seeing the wood for the trees...

It's not often that the daily news reveals a feel-good story, with the exception of the odd: "Cat stuck in tree. Firemen save the day.", or: "Woman on IVF gives birth to sextuplets." Assuming you can call that last story good news.

But we did get a genuine, one-hundred percent, cast-iron feel-good story and the damned thing happened so quickly, everyone missed it!

For the first time in many a year, deforestation in the Amazon rain forest has been halved:

"Environment Minister Marina da Silva said some 9,000 sq km (3,475 sq miles) of forest was felled in the last year.

This compares with more than 18,000 sq km (6,950 sq miles) in 2003 to 2004."

Now, what I'd like to know is, what with all the emphasis being on the environment and what not, how the hell did that one slip under the noses of the media with hardly so much as a mention in the page edge column inches in the tabloids?

I mean, c'mon, this is big good news, isn't it?

There are notable issues and conditions attached to this good news, however:

"... environmental groups, while welcoming the fall, are still treating the announcement with caution.

The figures, they say, are still estimates from satellite images which, because of cloud cover, have a 20% margin of error.

They say a fall in soy prices may also have had an impact, with farmers no longer clearing land."

But even with this being the case, this really does require some more attention, surely?

"Greenpeace said it was too soon to talk about a long-term slowing of the destruction of the forest, warning that illegal loggers may just be biding their time.

The only firm conclusion, the group said, was that when the government decides to mount major operations against illegal loggers, this does have a positive short-term effect."

If this is the case and Brazil can demonstrate that they are able and willing to police the Amazon -- which is no mean feat, by the way -- then this should be applauded and the wider global community should think of ways of extending the reach and the resources of the Brazilian forces and the government to better deal with the illegal logging and make more concerted efforts to drive home the message of sustainable harvesting methods, replantation and the like.

This is good news, and for me at least, this comes on the back of a great many positives that I have been seeing and hearing about over the last three or four years.

This could be too early to say for sure, but I honestly do feel that we are turning a corner...