One of the many slums in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. Photo: World Resources Institute (flickr)

In Brazil, forests are rapidly being destroyed, slums are expanding, and crime has reached an all-time high.

The solution? Government officials in Rio de Janeiro insist that building a nine mile, cinder-block wall around their slums will help to prevent the Atlantic rain forest from further deforestation, and restrict the expansion of these shanty towns. Human rights groups and many residents of the slums — known as favelas — disagree, reports the Wall Street Journal. They claim the purpose of the walls is to further separate the slums from Rio's beautiful beaches and wealthier residents.

To give the government's claims some credit, the expansion of favelas has contributed to Rio De Janeiro's rain forest destruction over the years. In 2004, deforestation reached its peak when 10,588 square miles of forest were destroyed. The Atlantic rain forest, an ecosystem that once was a large and flourishing part of Brazil, has lost 93 percent of its forest cover. The walls are meant to serve as "ecobarriers," to prevent the favelas from expanding into the already at-risk, forested hillsides.

But it seems that the reason for the wall stems beyond the goal to protect the rain forest. The Journal explains:

it's all part of a wider plan by Rio officials to clean up the famously freewheeling city. Under Mr. Cabral, the state intends to hire 22,000 police officers in part to occupy favelas now under control of drug gangs.

Residents of Rio's slums claim the wall will only cage them in and restrict their ability to come and go as they please. Human rights groups are up in arms as well — referring to the proposed wall as a means of "social apartheid."

Representatives of Rochina, one of the many Rio slums in, convinced government officials to replace the high wall with ecological parks, paths, and low walls that still mark the limits of the neighborhood. Other favelas are are trying to follow suit and some government officials are reportedly considering alternatives to the wall. In the meantime, the construction of the walls continue until perhaps a different idea is agreed upon that makes the barrier clear without making residents feel trapped.

A child running through the streets of his favela. Photo: carf (flickr)

Brazil's fight to eliminate the drug trade in its urban slums has been violent and expensive.

An estimated 1,300 people were killed by police in 2007 alone with a staggering murder rate of 150 homicides per 100,000 people in the Rio slums — that's 10 times greater than Chicago's.

And crime is costly. One UN report says the economic and social costs of Brazil's crime represents 10 percent of the country's Gross Domestic Product. Spending on crime means there's less money available for education, health care and other social services.

But in the hope of ending the war and expelling the drug trade, the government is changing its policing philosophy and trying a new approach in two slums (favelas in Spanish and Portuguese): Santa Marta and the City of God, made famous by a film of the same name released in 2002.

Rather than conducting what some call "hit-and-run" drug raids, police are entering communities and staying. They are getting to know the residents and attempting to build trust. Coupled with this new policing strategy is a $17 million investment in communities that's paying for new infrastructure such as a soccer field, housing and wireless Internet connections.

“We are working in a way that the state is present in the day-to-day life of poor people," President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva tells the BBC. "In the past it was only the police intervening with lots of brutality which punished the guilty and the innocent — very often only the innocent. Now we have police there, who are becoming a community police force.”

(To hear more from President de Silva, check out this BBC interview.)

Reuters reports that for now, the drug lords are gone from these communities. But while changing strategies offers hope, it won’t be easy to make a permanent change. After years of neglect and abuse, residents are slow to trust. Many are afraid the police will leave and they will have to answer to the drug lords once they return.

“If you ask the residents here what is better — the government or the parallel power — I bet you the huge majority will say the parallel power until they get used to the new reality," says the head of a residents' association in Santa Marta. (Watch a BBC report on how the new policy is changing Santa Marta.)

There are nearly 1,000 slums in Rio, and many question the program’s viability in favelas more sprawling than Santa Marta and the City of God. Although many are skeptical of the new policing strategy, the increased security coupled with the investments in infrastructure is certainly a step in the right direction.