Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest has hit a 15-year high after surging by more than a fifth in one year, new data reveals.

Figures by the country’s National Institute for Space Research show around 13,235 square kilometres (5,110 square miles) of the tropical habitat were lost between August 2020 and July 2021.

The loss is equivalent to an area more than 8 times the size of Greater London, or around 1.9 million football pitches.

The findings come despite Brazil signing a major global deal to reverse deforestation at November’s Cop26 climate conference in Glasgow.

It pledged to end illegal deforestation by 2028, which would require a massive effort to rein in local industries.

Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, has continued to call for more farming and mining in protected parts of the rainforest.

In the run-up to Cop26, his officials boasted of preliminary monthly figures pointing to a slight fall over 2020-21 as evidence they were tackling the problem.

Pointing out the report’s date of October 27, however, Brazilian advocacy group Climate Observatory said: ‘The government went to COP26 knowing the deforestation data and hid it.’

Citing official sources, news agency Reuters said Bolsonaro’s government had received the report before the summit.

Environment Minister Joaquim Pereira Leite said at a news conference on Thursday: ‘The numbers are still a challenge for us and we have to be more forceful in relation to these crimes.

He insisted that the report ‘does not exactly reflect the situation in the last few months’, claiming that enforcement against illegal deforestation has risen recently.

The wider anti-deforestation deal at Cop26 saw almost £14bn of public and private money pledged to helping developing countries reverse ecological damage and support indigenous communities affected by it.

The agreement was seen as a major boost to climate efforts, as the Amazon is home to at least 10% of the world’s biodiversity and its trees absorb vast amounts of CO2 that would otherwise speed up global warming.

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