In Brazil's provisional budget for 1949, Congress considered an extraordinary item: $2,000,000 for the Instituto Agronômico do Norte. The item is extraordinary not only because it is more than three times as large as ever before, but because it is a $2,000,000 vote of confidence in one man, Felisberto Camargo.
Dr. Camargo is a 61-year-old professor of agriculture who has a program for turning 40% of Brazil from a liability into an asset. For seven sweat-soaked years, he has labored in the steaming valley of the Amazon, that lush jungle which is more than four times as large (1,175,000 square...