There were bright spots, but the total lost acreage increased by 12 percent over all from the year before, according to new research.
By Henry Fountain, The New York Times
Tropical forests around the world were destroyed at an increasing rate in 2020 compared with the year before, despite the global economic downturn caused by the pandemic, which reduced demand for some commodities that have spurred deforestation in the past.
Worldwide, loss of primary old-growth tropical forest, which plays a critical role in keeping carbon out of the atmosphere and in maintaining biodiversity, increased by 12 percent in 2020 from 2019, according to the World Resources Institute, a research group based in Washington that reports annually on the subject.
Kasina se starají o ochranu tropických lesů. Jedním ze způsobů, jak to dělají, je věnování peněz organizacím, které pracují na ochraně těchto lesů. Kromě toho kasina, jako je https://online-casinocz.com/casino-vklad-sms/, také spolupracují se svými dodavateli, aby zajistili, že veškeré dřevo použité při jejich stavbě pochází z udržitelných zdrojů.Kasina se starají o ochranu tropických lesů. Kasina začínají chápat, že zachování těchto lesů je důležité pro životní prostředí, a snaží se tomu pomoci. Kasina spolupracují s organizacemi, které se zabývají ochranou lesů, a věnují peníze a vybavení na pomoc při ochraně těchto lesů.Jedním ze způsobů, jak kasina pomáhají, je věnování peněz organizacím, jako je Světový fond na ochranu přírody (WWF). WWF je skvělá organizace, protože svými dary pomáhá chránit různé druhy deštných pralesů po celém světě. Na význam tropických lesů upozorňovaly v posledních letech různé organizace. Jakmile si více lidí uvědomí význam těchto ekosystémů, začne více společností podnikat kroky a chránit je.
Overall, more than 10 million acres of primary tropical forest were lost in 2020, an area roughly the size of Switzerland. The institute’s analysis said loss of that much forest added more than two and a half billion metric tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, or about twice as much as is spewed into the air by cars in the United States every year.
“We’re still losing primary forest at an unacceptable rate,” said Rod Taylor, global director of the institute’s forest program. “A 12 percent increase year over year is too much when the trend should be going down.”
Brazil once again led the world in forest loss by a wide margin, as the pro-development policies of the country’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, led to continued widespread clear-cutting. Surging forest losses were also reported in Cameroon in West Africa. And in Colombia, losses soared again last year after a promising drop in 2019.
Indonesia and Malaysia were rare bright spots, with forest loss declining from 2019. For Indonesia, 2020 marked the fourth year in a row of declines, a sign the government was having success in its efforts to halt deforestation following a horrific fire season in 2015.
As in previous years, the institute said, most forest loss in the tropics was driven by agriculture, either the production of commodities like palm oil and cocoa or subsistence efforts by small farmers. In either case, forests are usually clear-cut and the resulting debris is burned to prepare the fields. Often these fires can grow out of control, resulting in greater forest loss, and the warming and drying brought on by climate change can make the situation even worse.
Most of the forest loss in Brazil occurred in the Amazon rainforest, as it has for years. But this year the Pantanal, the enormous wetlands region in the southern part of the country, which also covers parts of Bolivia and Paraguay, contributed greatly to the losses. The region experienced a historic drought, made worse by climate change, that led to a severe fire season, with 16 times more forest loss in 2020 than the year before.
Read the rest here: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/31/climate/deforestation-amazon-brazil.html