Brazil's president Jair Bolsonaro doubled down in defence of his Amazon policies despite international condemnation for allowing loggers and farmers to trigger the worst wildfires on record.

Mr Bolsonaro, the far-Right former army captain and ally of Donald Trump, used a rare televised address to say that those living in the Amazon basin should be allowed "to develop along with the rest of the country" by exploiting the "incalculable wealth … of natural resources" in the region.

His speech was met with protests across the country, with residents in major Brazilian cities whistling, banging pots and sounding car horns to show their displeasure.

It followed stark warnings from members of the G7 and European countries in particular that threatened to cancel a huge trade deal with Latin America.

There have been about 75,000 fires in the Amazon this year alone, an 83 per cent increase on last year. The fires have been largely blamed on loggers and farmers who have been given the green light by a raft of land and business reforms that have rolled back environmental regulations. Despite the uptick in fires, the number of fines dished out this year has fallen 29.4 per cent.