By Brian Clark Howard

National Geographic

In Brazil’s Mato Grosso state, Route 163, also known as the Soybean Highway, cuts across farmland that had been Amazon rain forest a few decades ago.

Brazil’s success in slowing rain forest destruction has resulted in enormous reductions in carbon emissions and shows that it’s possible to zealously promote sustainability while still growing the economy, suggests a new study out Thursday.

A second study out this week also underscores Brazil’s success and shows that deforestation has also slowed in several other tropical countries.

Since 2004, farmers and ranchers in Brazil have saved over 33,000 square miles (86,000 square kilometers) of rain forest from clear-cutting, the rough equivalent of 14.3 million soccer fields, a team of scientists and economists from the U.S. and South America report inScience. At the same time, production of beef and soy from Brazil’s Amazon region rose.

The country has reduced…