Most of us have memories of trees as children, from climbing trees, to spending time in gardens that have shades from trees but these trees have been taken for granted, and nearly half of the world's forest has been cleared.
If you always check the news, you will agree with me that one thing is true that fire is ravaging the world's rainforest including the Brazilian Amazon Rainforest. Most time, these fire are man made fire that were intended to clear the land for agriculture but then the fire spread uncontrollably.
While the G7 and other government bodies have contributed millions of dollars to stop this fire, it doesn't look like the Brazilian government is doing much to stop deforestation and this has caused lots of support to stop. Across different continents, the world's rainforest is gradually vanishing and if nothing is done about it, it will become a thing of a past in maybe about 100 years.
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When we talk about the rain forest, we cannot neglect the canopy of trees, or the Gibbon calls that can be heard from distance far, or the movement at night. Seeing animals that look like aliens, or different shades of snakes makes the rain forest impressive, also the bird, and creeping insects make the rain forest a great place, and the importance it has to our world cannot be quantified. So with the news we hear, it looks like the rainforest is going to disappear soon.
Rainforests like that of Malaysia, Indonesia and Borneo are being destroyed on a regular basis with thousands of hectares being lost yearly and lots of unique plantts and animals die yearly, as well as affecting the carbon storage since plants are dying and this affects our battle against climate change. Deforestation happens due to so many reasons, from cattle ranching, unregulated or illegal logging of timber, and planting of palm oil.
While natural disasters can affect forests, they tend to grow back very fast but nothing destroys a forest faster than human activity. Over 1 million square kilometer of forest has been lost in the last 20 years with over 12 billion tree cut down yearly. This deforestation has also displaced the animals that guide the forest. As our population increases, we will certainly need more woods than what we currently use, but when they are properly managed, it can be useful since trees are renewable resources.
In the face of escalating deforestation, the paramount question is how to save the rainforest. One crucial aspect is finding a balance between agriculture and conservation. Failing to strike this balance will perpetuate deforestation as we grapple with addressing the global hunger problem. Establishing guidelines for preserving biodiversity becomes imperative when navigating the intersection of agriculture and forest conservation.
Illegal logging, fueled by greed and the pursuit of modernization, poses another challenge. Saving the rainforest requires a delicate compromise between industries, ecology, and sociopolitics. Although it might seem like an insurmountable task, finding this compromise is essential for the preservation of these vital ecosystems.
One good to about forest is that they can recover when allowed to. All that is needed is just the slightest opportunity of leaving the ground fallow, and they start to grow to restore themselves from nothing. We need to understand that carbon dioxide is being removed by plants on a daily basis, as they store them in their leaves, stem, and root. In other for our forest to grow, we should protect the last remaining forest as they still host species of trees and animals. We can also plant trees, so as to be able to help us get trees and allow animals live in them. We need our forest to re-wild and nature to come back to how it was before.
Reference
- https://study.com/academy/lesson/deforestation-definition-causes-consequences.html
- https://justdiggit.org/deforestation/
- https://www.fao.org/3/cb9360en/online/src/html/deforestation-land-degradation.html
- https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/resrep02091.8.pdf
- https://wwfar.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/deforestation_fronts___full_report_2021.pdf