Climate change could kill the Amazon rainforest even if deforestation and emissions are curbed, scientists at the Met Office fear. By Richard Alleyne, Science Correspondent in Copenhagen Macaw - Year of discovery writing competition Between 20 and 40 per cent of the Amazon?s trees are predicted to disappear Photo: GETTY Even small rises in temperature could destroy large swathes of the jungle, they believe. Changing rainfall patterns already under way could leave up to three quarters of the forest dry and withered by the middle of the next century. The result would not only be an ecological "catastrophe" but could also turn the global weather system on its head, the researchers said. The findings were presented to the climate summit in Copenhagen by scientists at the Met Office