The Amazon rainforest is the largest tropical rainforest in the world, covering over five and a half a million square kilometres (1.4 billion acres).

10% of the world’s known species live in the Amazon rainforest.

It is home to around 2 and a half million different insect species as well as over 40000 plant species.

In both 2005 and 2010 the Amazon rainforest suffered severe droughts that killed off large amounts of vegetation in the worst affected areas.

The Amazon rainforest is also known as Amazonia or the Amazon Jungle.

Around 80% of the food we eat originally came from rainforests. Some of the more popular examples include coffee, chocolate, rice, tomatoes, potatoes, bananas, black pepper, pineapples and corn.

Over a quarter of the medicines we use today have their origins in the rainforests

About 30% of our carbon emissions come from burning the rainforests.

70% of plants found to have anticancer properties are found only in the rainforest.