○自由な題名 ○ひなまつり ○窓、愛国心 ○Rainforests are perhaps英文のみのページ（翻訳用）
Rainforests are perhaps the most important places on Earth. And yet we destroy thousands of square kilometers every year.
In 1950, rainforests covered fifteen percent of the Earth's land. We have already destroyed half of these. Will there be any rainforests in the year 2020? No one knows the answer to that question.
Rainforests are home to about fifty million people. There are also millions of species of animals, plants and insects which live there. In 10,000 square meters of rainforest there are perhaps more than 8,000 different species of plants.
When we destroy the rainforests, forest people lose their homes, and thousands of species of animals and plants disappear -- and once they have disappeared, we will never be able to see them again.
More than half of the species of plants and animals of the Earth live in the rainforests. We know about only a small number of these species. If we want to learn more about them, we must hurry, because they are disappearing quickly.
The peoples of the rainforests have always used plants to make medicines. Today, all over the world, people use medicines made from rainforest plants. The medicines for malaria or leukemia come from trees or plants in the rainforests. Many new medicines are waiting in the rainforests. If we destroy the forests, we will never find them.
Rainforest trees are used to make things which we use every day. Rubber, for example, is used to make many things. The fruits of many forest trees are good to eat -- forest people have eaten them for thousands of years. Today, all over the world, people eat rainforest food plants; for example, coffee, tea, oranges, and rice. Maize, an important food for many people of the world, is another rainforest plant.
In 1970, a disease destroyed half the maize in the United States of America. Scientists began to look for new species of maize in the rainforests. In 1987, in the rainforest in Mexico, they found a new species which is stronger than other species. But we nearly lost this new species of maize, because people were already cutting down that part of the rainforest.
Nobody knows how many useful plants are already lost because people have destroyed many of the rainforests of the world.
The trees of the rainforests help the Earth's air because their leaves use CO2 and make oxygen. We cannot live without oxygen, and some of it is made in the rainforests.
The rainforests are also important, because they control some of the Earth's weather. If the rainforests become smaller, there will be more CO2 and that will make our Earth warmer. Today, the Earth is slowly getting warmer, and in some places changes in the weather are making life much more difficult for millions of people. We have to learn more about the Earth's weather while we still have the rainforests.