Nacho Doce / Reuters

An elderly woman rests next to her grandchild in a hammock inside their house in the village of Pimental in Itaituba, in the state of Para, on May 26. In the 19 months since Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff took office, longstanding rules that curtail deforestation and protect millions of square kilometers of watershed have been rolled back. She issued an executive order to shrink or repurpose seven protected woodlands, making way for hydroelectric dams and other infrastructure projects, and to legalize settlements by farmers and miners. These photos were received by NBCNews.com on Aug. 3 as part of a Reuters special report.

Nacho Doce / Reuters

An aerial view shows illegal deforestation close to the Amazonia National Park in Itaituba, state of Para, on May 25.

Below is an excerpt from a Reuters special report: Brazil backslides on protecting the Amazon

Reuters -- Last year President Dilma Rousseff authorized a change that ceded much responsibility for environmental oversight to local officials. Of 168 Ibama, Brazil's widely respected federal environmental agency, field offices operating a few years ago, 91 have been shuttered, according to Ibama employees. Ivo Lubrinna says Ibama agents used to fine him and other miners for violations. Now, he leads a team that inspects wildcatting sites. So far, he says, he has levied few fines.

The shift to local control is one of many changes implemented under Rousseff's administration that, taken together, constitute an all-out retreat from nearly two decades of progressive federal environmental policy.

In the 19 months since Rousseff took office, longstanding rules that curtail deforestation and protect millions of square kilometers of watershed have been rolled back. She issued an executive order to shrink or repurpose seven protected woodlands, making way for hydroelectric dams and other infrastructure projects, and to legalize settlements by farmers and miners.

And she has slowed to a near halt a process, uninterrupted during the previous three administrations, of setting aside land for national parks, wildlife reserves and other "conservation units."

Read the full story.

Related links:

• 60 dams in Brazil's Amazon? Controversy spills over into 'Earth Summit II'
• 20 years later, will world make good on 'broken promises'?
• Slideshow: Dams rising across Brazil's Amazon
• Slideshow: Brazil's balancing act

Nacho Doce / Reuters

A boy walks on the Trans-Amazonian highway in Itaituba, in the state of Para, on May 24.

Slideshow: Dams rising across Brazil's Amazon

Mario Tama / Getty Images

The Belo Monte dam is among 60 Brazil plans to build in its Amazon region to help power its growing economy. But the vision also has its critics.

Launch slideshow

Mist rolls through a deforested section of the Amazon rainforest on June 8, 2012 in Para state, Brazil.

photos and reporting by Mario Tama / Getty Images

The Amazon, home to 60 percent of the world’s largest forest and 20 percent of the Earth’s oxygen, remains threatened by the rapid development of Brazil. The area is populated by over 20 million people and challenged by deforestation, agriculture, mining, a governmental dam building spree and illegal land speculation.

More than one million hectares of wood have disappeared in protected indigenous reserves between 1987 and 2011, according to the Brazilian government. More than 242 square kilometers in the reserve have already been destroyed according to the National Institute for Space Research (INPE), which tracks rainforest destruction by satellite.

A truck transports illegally harvested Amazon rainforest logs near protected indigenous land on June 10, 2012 near the Arariboia Indigenous Reserve, Maranhao state, Brazil.

Workers load charcoal, produced from illegally harvested Amazon rainforest wood, into a truck on June 8, 2012 in Rondon do Para, Brazil.

Illegal wood charcoal is used to power smelters producing pig iron to make steel for industries including U.S. auto manufacturing, according to Greenpeace. Illegal charcoal camps can result in slave labor and the destruction of rainforest on protected indigenous lands. Over 2,700 charcoal camp workers were liberated from conditions akin to slavery between 2003 and 2011, according to Greenpeace. 

A worker sweats as he works for $40 per truckload of charcoal.

Slideshow:

Mario Tama / Getty Images

The Amazon rainforest has meant prosperous times for many in Brazil, but environmental and cultural disaster for others.

Launch slideshow

Read more about Brazil and the Rio Earth Summit

See more of Brazil’s environmental balancing act

See more of Mario Tama's work

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Lunae Parracho / AFP - Getty Images

A member of the Public Security National Force --a national police elite unit-- walks through on the Amazonic forest reserve of Trairao, west of Para state, northern Brazil, looking for illegal deforestation places, on Dec. 4. The Brazilian authorities are conducting the 'Capitao do Mato' operation from Nov. 18 to Dec. 8, to fight the illegal extraction of wood in the national forest reserves of Trairao and Riosinho do Afrisio.

Reuters reports:

Brazil's Senate passed a landmark reform of the country's land law on Tuesday, infuriating environmentalists who say it could spark a new wave of deforestation in the Amazon region.

The new so-called Forest Code relaxes requirements on the amount of forest coverage farmers must maintain on their properties, a change that producers in the agricultural powerhouse say is needed to end years of legal uncertainty.

Lunae Parracho / AFP - Getty Images

Aerial view of an illegal wood extraction site at the Amazonic forest reserve of Trairao, western Para state, northern Brazil on Dec. 4.

The Senate approved the basic text of the bill late Tuesday, leaving dozens of proposed amendments to be voted on later.

The government says environmentalists' fears are mostly unfounded and that strict enforcement of the new rules will result in the restoration of 24 million hectares of forest, equal to the size of the United Kingdom.

Read the full story here.

Lunae Parracho / AFP - Getty Images

A Federal Police officer walks by planks at an illegal sawmill in Valdinei Ferreira Jango, near the Amazonic Forest reserve of Trairao, western state of Para, northern Brazil on Dec. 4.

Lunae Parracho / AFP - Getty Images

The couple Maria and Domingos Siva pose inside their house in Areias -- a settlement created to host Amazonic people alongside the BR163 national road -- near the Amazonic Forest reserve of Trairao, western state of Para, northern Brazil on Dec. 4.

Lunae Parracho / AFP - Getty Images

The main street of Areias -- a settlement created to host Amazonic people alongside the BR163 national road -- near the Amazonic Forest reserve of Trairao, western state of Para, northern Brazil on Dec. 4.

How Hwee Young of EPA reports from Kunlun Qi, China: Inner Mongolia, China's third largest province, is fighting severe desertification. Over-grazing, logging, deforestation of land for expanding farms and population pressure, along with droughts have steadily turned vast fertile grasslands into sandy dunes.

How Hwee Young / EPA

Farmers ride a horse and cart through the Taminchagan desert of Kunlun Qi, in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China on 23 April. Inner Mongolia is fighting severe desertification.

Desertification of China's land has caused grave economic losses as farmers abandon parched lands and worsened rural poverty. Winds from the desert have whipped up sandstorms across the country.

How Hwee Young / EPA

A Mongolian ethnic minority farmer with her child on a farm in Kunlun Qi.

How Hwee Young / EPA

Poplar tree saplings that are to be used for planting trees in Kunlun Qi. Tree planting has become a key government effort to fight desertification.

China has adopted measures to stop the land degradation such as reforestation, resettling nomadic Mongolians from grasslands to urban areas and restricting grazing areas. Tree planting has become a key government effort to fight desertification and many non-governmental organizations (NGOs), such as Shanghai Roots & Shoots, are supporting the government’s reforestation endeavors. The NGO launched the Million Tree Project in 2007 in Kunlun Qi with the aim to plant its first million trees by 2014 to hinder the expanding desert. By the end of April this year, they had planted more than 600,000 trees.

How Hwee Young / EPA

Local farmer Chen Guo fen holds her daughter as they look around at their field where volunteers of non-government organization Shanghai Roots and Shoots are helping to plant tree saplings in Kunlun Qi.

Local farmers take care of the trees on plots of land allocated by the local government where they are licensed to harvest the trees that have reached maturity, but only on the condition that they replant on the same plot. Many farmers have embraced the tree planting initiative, seeing it as a win-win situation that protects their crops and provides economic rewards. "It is good to plant trees to preserve our land and save them for the next generation," says local farmer Wang Xide.

How Hwee Young / EPA

A lone poplar tree stands in the Taminchagan desert of Kunlun Qi.