New data from the MapBiomas network confirms that deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon dropped in 2025 to its lowest point since monitoring began in 2019. 

Last year, Brazil lost 985,000 hectares (2.4 million acres) of native vegetation—a figure that represents a 20.6 percent reduction compared with 2024 and the smallest annual total recorded by the network since it started tracking forest loss, according to France24.

This decline was seen across all six of Brazil’s major ecosystems. Within the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, forest loss decreased by 23.5 percent. However, the pace of destruction remains serious, with the equivalent of five trees continuing to be cut down every second.

The figures provided by MapBiomas, a group of universities, non-governmental organisations, and technology firms, do not include areas destroyed by fire. Nevertheless, 2025 saw relatively fewer large-scale wildfires after the record-breaking fire season experienced in 2024, France24 says.

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The Cerrado, a vast and biodiverse tropical savannah located south of the Amazon, remains the most severely affected biome, accounting for more than half of the country’s total vegetation loss. 

The report also highlighted that agriculture was the primary driver of land-use change, responsible for 99 percent of native vegetation loss.

These improved environmental statistics coincide with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s efforts to reverse the policies of his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, whose administration was marked by four years of widespread forest clearing. 

Lula has made environmental protection a central pillar of his government, pledging to eliminate illegal deforestation entirely by 2030 according to France24. As he seeks a fourth term in the October elections, he is expected to present the reduction in deforestation as a key success of his current administration.