The Jari project was an attempt to create a tropical tree farm in Brazil for producing pulp for paper. Background The Jari project was a brainchild of US entrepreneur and billionaire Daniel K. Ludwig. In the 1950s he noticed that demand for paper was rising. Since the forests of the temperate zone were already in use, the supply of the wood pulp for paper was fixed. Ludwig foresaw a future increase in the price of paper due to the increase of mass media. Since most of the natural forest timber was not suitable for paper production, Ludwig planned a site where the natural forest would be replaced by a tree farm. It would have to be started decades ahead to supply the future paper production. History Growth Ludwig selected the fast-growing tropical tree Gmelina arborea for his tree farm. At first he considered locating his tree farm in Costa Rica but the Brazilian military government encouraged him to settle on the lower reaches of the Rio Jari, a tributary of the Amazon River. In 1967, Ludwig bought 1.6 million acres (6,475 km2) for $3 million. Ludwig controlled the project mainly from the United States. He built a settlement, Monte Dourado, with houses, schools, the only hospital in the area, bakery, supermarket, nurseries, bridges and community buildings. He also built roads and railways. The clearing of the land using heavy bulldozers damaged the topsoil the trees were to be planted in. It became necessary to employ local workers instead for land clearing. Removing the forest cover allowed sunshine to harden the lateritic soil. Gmelina turned out to grow crooked stems, which were very hard to load onto trucks. Also, the new trees were damaged by the numerous insects living in the area of the Amazon. Pinus radiata was planted on the sandier river-bottom soils. Other settlements, the "free cities" of Beiradão and Beiradinho, grew up across the river to provide services not contemplated by the American planners. In its heyday, the Jari Project had 35,000 workers. Ludwig had also commissioned two large ship-shaped platforms that were built in Japan and floated to the Jari Project. One barge module contained the pulping sector of the pulp mill. This module housed the digesting, the brown stock, the bleach plant, and the pulp machine. The second module housed the recovery boiler, the evaporators and the recaust. The pulp mill barge was finished in 1978