The BR-163 stretches 1,097 miles from the port of Santrarem on the Amazon river to Cuiaba, the capital of the state of Mato Grosso in Brazil.

Bruno Garcez crosses the Brazilian rainforest on this newly completed truck-route that environmentalists say will bring disease, death and destruction to indigenous communities and pretty much the same to the forest in the longer term.

The Brazilian government says that such roads are essential to the economic survival of the country. But what do ordinary Brazilians think of this huge road?

How do they feel about developed countries, who have been busy polluting the planet for a century and cutting down trees non-stop, telling them that they must preserve it?

This is a rare Brazilian portrait of the world's greatest environmental icon and the lives within it.

Listen to the programme
	Listen to the programme

First broadcast in July 2005. Produced by Bruno Garcez of the BBC's Brazilian Service.