It’s hard to be green

THE Yasuní National Park in Ecuador’s slice of the Amazon contains countless endangered species of animals and birds. For that reason Rafael Correa, the country’s president, hatched a scheme under which he would forebear from extracting the oil that lies beneath the park’s northeastern corner, if the rest of the world put up $3.6 billion, or half its estimated value. The world spurned this offer and last month Mr Correa cancelled it, saying that the estimated 840m barrels of oil in the area, which he now values at $18 billion, would help him to continue to cut poverty.