That's insane. Brazilians don't deserve the economic development anymore? After Americans got rid of their wildlife? Rich Californians have to pay for Brazil the real price of not growing economically at directions that benefits them.
In addition, Economic development is not linked to deforestation.
Brazil has now less forest coverage than Japan and South Korea who have wayyyy higher population density, and both used to be poorer than Brazil.
Brazil was on its way to development previously when the industry started to settle there and services started to follow, but bad governance and corruption made it all too fragile and some official just chose another way.
As usual, natural resources are more a curse than a good thing for development as it encourages lazy politics and low productivity.
Also the marginal value of forests and wildlife have changed significantly over time as they have been depleted. The tradeoffs that made sense then don't make as much sense now.