An area of a rainforest the size of a football field is being destroyed each second.

Giant bamboo plants can grow up to nine inches a day.

The trees of a tropical rainforest are so densely packed that rain falling on the canopy can take as long as 10 minutes to reach the ground.

In the moist rainforests of South America, sloths move so slowly that algae are able to grow in their fur.

Some rainforest monkeys are omnivores, eating both animals and plants.

More than 2,000 different species of butterflies are found in the rainforests of South America.

The forests of Central Africa are home to more than 8,000 different species of plants.

Flying animals of Asian rainforests include frogs, squirrels and snakes.

80 per cent of the flowers in the Australian rainforests are not found anywhere else in the world.

Bats are essential for the pollination of many tropical foodstuffs such as bananas and mangoes.

One out of four ingredients in our medicine is from rainforest plants.— Compiled by The Surfer