In this remote, environmentally embattled corner of the Brazilian Amazon, safe sex is giving forest conservation a boost. The scrubby cattle-pasture setting in the western state of Acre seems an unlikely place for a factory. But in a sparkling new plant located in a roadside field, workers are running manufacturing tests. Three assembly lines dip suggestively tipped glass molds into a creamy liquid, convey them through a drier and fill a plastic crate with the finished product—all-natural condoms. Made of latex tapped from native rubber trees in the nearby Chico Mendes Extractive Reserve, the condoms pile up at the rate of 75 a minute. Industrial manager David Melo da Costa Bussons picks one up and stretches it like a balloon. In the... [Log in to read more]
