Rainforest preservation is a very complicated subject, and what one country is doing (or not doing) isn't necessarily applicable to another country. Each nation faces a uniquely different and often challenging situation. Brazil, for instance, the country with the largest rainforest in the world, has a tremendous population under the poverty line and a desperate need for economic opportunities; at the same time they are trying to convert to biofuels, which requires large amounts of agricultural land, most of which comes from deforestation. Indonesia, another country where rainforest depletion is a major problem, is the home of some new initiatives designed to relocate palm oil plantations (a major cause of deforestation) to areas that have already been deforested, thus preserving virgin rainforest. Some countries are not doing much at all, like Burma, for example, whose military government appears to be encouraging or at least tolerating illegal logging in its rainforests of teak wood. Rather than judging countries against each other on some raw numeric, such as percentage of deforestation over the previous year or number of acres preserved, the political, economic and environmental situation of each country must be judged on its own merit.

Citations: http://www.rain-tree.com/facts.htm
http://www.wri.org/press/2009/10/rainforest-preservation-project-underway-indone...

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