28 OCTOBER 1995, Page 34

A forest of misconceptions

Sir: Christopher Fildes rightly objects to huge reports from the World Bank, but no rain-forests are destroyed to produce them. Paper is generally made from soft- woods grown in temperate climates. The hardwoods of the tropical rain forests are certainly under threat, but not from report- writers. In any case, this cliché probably wasn't worth using once, let alone twice.

Let me also warn against another popu- lar journalistic misconception — the quan- tum leap. A quantum leap is a step so tiny that it cannot be realistically visualised, and not a giant stride, the sense in which it is commonly misused. I fear that this is a lost cause, but let's keep trying to save the rain- forest.

Judith Mirzoeff 9 Westmoreland Road, London SW13