From action.RAN.org

What do chocolate, popcorn, cola, and salsa have in common? They are all foods whose ingredients were originally discovered in the rainforest! Many delicious foods originally came from the rainforest, including: bananas, pineapples, oranges, lemons, coconuts, cashews, peanuts, corn, rice, avocados, onions, tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, ginger, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, cocoa, and even kola nut (which is used to flavor cola drinks). Even though we can now grow many of these foods ourselves or buy them at the grocery store, we must thank the rainforests for providing us with these foods in the first place.

Eating foods that come from the rainforest is not always good. For instance, in order to make enough orange juice for everyone, some orange juice companies destroy rainforest land to plant orange groves. One thing we can do to help save the rainforests is to drink orange juice made only from oranges that are grown in the United States. Orange juice containers will say where their oranges are grown. Oftentimes it will say that the oranges are from Brazil, which means they were grown on cleared rainforest land. If that's the case, try to find another brand of orange juice to buy.

Eating less beef is another thing we can do to help save the rainforests. Thousands of acres of rainforest are slashed and burned each year to grow grass for cattle pastures. Cows eat this grass and then get butchered and sent to the United States to be made into fast-food hamburgers. For every quarter pound fast-food hamburger that comes from the rainforest, 55 square feet of rainforest is destroyed. That's about the size of a small kitchen-and that's just for one hamburger! Choosing to eat less beef can really help save the rainforests. Make a list of healthy foods to eat instead of beef, and share it with your family and friends.

Also, look for snack foods like nuts and dried fruits that are labeled sustainably harvested from the rainforest. This means that they came from the rainforests without harming the trees, plants, animals or people that live there. Eating these foods helps the rainforest, and they're good for you too!

We all need food to survive. Making positive, rainforest-friendly choices about what we eat can help the rainforests survive as well. We all have the power to save the rainforests!