Tropical forests may be vanishing even faster than previously thought
There’s no other way to put it: Cutting down tropical forests is disastrous. The lush plant life in these areas sequesters huge amounts of carbon, pulling it out of the atmosphere to fuel plant growth. Chopping down a rainforest releases carbon back to the atmosphere, worsening global warming.
But at least this problem was supposed to be getting better — a little.
According to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, recent years have seen “decreasing deforestation rates and increased afforestation” — and thus, less carbon dioxide pouring into to the atmosphere from this source. Similarly, a 2010 report from the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization found that while 16 million hectares of forest per year were lost in the 1990s, only 13 million per year were lost in the 2000s. It noted in particular that two countries that have seen major tropical deforestation — Brazil and Indonesia — “have significantly reduced their rate of loss.”
But according to a new study just out in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, the U.N. has it wrong. The study, by the University of Maryland, College Park, geographer Do-Hyung Kim and two colleagues, uses satellite imagery to examine how tropical forests in particular are faring. And their answer is far from heartening.
“Our estimates indicate a 62% acceleration in net deforestation in the humid tropics from the 1990s to the 2000s,” write the authors.
More:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/02/26/weve-been-losing-tropical-forests-even-faster-than-previously-thought/
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