Brasilia, July 5 (RHC)-- In news from Brazil, a nonprofit environmental group is warning that deforestation of the Amazon rainforest increased by 20% in just the last nine months.

Experts say logging and land invasion are to blame for much of the loss.  President Jair Bolsonaro and his environment minister have worked to open the Amazon even further to logging, mining and agribusiness companies while violating the land rights of indigenous peoples.

Earlier this month, eight former environment ministers warned that Bolsonaro’s administration was systematically destroying Brazil’s environmental policies, with one former minister saying Brazil was becoming an “exterminator of the future.”