DEFORESTATION- The Modern Day Plague: Deforestation Globally

Many countries have been seriously affected by deforestation and some have lost nearly half of their original forestry. There are three forests in particular that are losing the highest amount of trees at an alarming rate and are seen as the most important forests for human beings and animals.

1) The Amazon: covers over a billion acres across areas such as Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, Brazil and Venezuela is seen as the most valuable rain forest in the world. It provides more than 20% of the world’s oxygen and is described as the “lungs of our planet” due to its importance for human beings

(University of Michigan. n.d)

Source: Stephen Fry/Getty (The Guardian. 2008)

2) The Congo Basin: It is a massive forest that expands through Cameroon, The Republic of Congo, The Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon. This forest houses some of the largest mammals seen in a forest, with 39 of them only being found in that area. Animal species in the forest include elephants, rare antelope, forest buffalo and houses more than half on the world’s current 700 gorillas. There are currently 270 different animal species living in the forest today along with tens of millions of human beings that rely on the forest for their livelihood.

(Austin, K. 2010)

Video of Academy Award Winning Marion Cotillard taken to The Congo by Greenpeace

3) Indonesia: It has become the third largest emitter of green house gases. Indonesia’s peat lands contain billions of tonnes of carbon and so when these lands are burned, drained and replaced by plants such as eucalyptus or palm oil, the carbon gets released into our air. The replaced plants are used in the production of disposable products such as toilet paper, packaging and glossy magazine pages for us consumers.