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Deforestation- Removing the Forests, or what?

By Tamanna Ikram
If today's satellites had been in orbit 10,000 years ago, they would have surveyed a ; X globe on which forests blanketed about half of all the land. From the Equator to the sub-polar regions, wherever perception was sufficient, trees covered the ground Even then, there were Instances of human disturbance, as people would cut trees to obtain fuel and building material, and cleared forests with fire to create meadows that would attract game But the human species, still spread out thinly, made only a modest dent In the forest cover. It took the agricultural revolution and the rise of permanent settlements to begin the mass destruction of forests that continues today.
Deforestation Isn't simply the loss of trees.
All forests perform Invaluable ecological services, from binding the soil with tree roots and sheltering It from the erosive effects of wind and rain, to storing and releasing the water that charges a region's rivers, to providing a habitat for millions of species. From a strictly anthropocentric point of view, forests are the source of thousands of useful products, including foods, flavorings, timber, fiber, drugs, dyes, rubber, resins, gums, oils, and waxes.
In the Tropics
Of all types of forests, those of the wet tropics gamer the most attention nowadays. They are commonly singled out as the world's foremost repositories of blo-diver$lty, although scientists are far from knowing enough about the variety of life on earth to be sure of this. They are often cited as the forests most threatened with imminent destruction but tropical deciduous forests are In an even worse state. As for biomass the sum total of living tissue Within an ecosystem certain rain forests of the Temperate Zone surpass their counterparts in the tropics. Nevertheless, it is the value and plight of the tropical rain forests that have seized the public imagination.
News of the ongoing destruction of these forests through commercial logging, cattle ranching, plantation operation, slash-and-burn farming, fuel wood collection, charcoal making, dam building, al prospecting, and gold mining is inescapable, and Ihe effects of forest removal are far-reaching If people clear the forest by burning it, the ashes may enrich the soil for a few years, but this residual fertility soon wears out. The ground exposed to the tropical sun, bakes hard Exposed to the rain, it erodes Rivers choke with silt, and flooding threatens communities downstream As the forests disappear, so do the animals they once sheltered and the indigenous people, who die out with their sophisticated knowledge gained from centuries of intimate association with their environment.
The rain forests of southern Asia and much of the Malay Archipelago, historically closest to crowded cities and densely settled countryside, have suffered the most. The Atlantic forests of Brazil, the Guinea forests of West Africa, and the coastal forests of Queensland in Australia are also far-gone Logging pressure, until recently confined to the margins of the Amazon forests of South America, the Congo forests of Central Africa, and the forests of Borneo, is now shifting to the forest interiors Even the remote and relatively intact forests of New Guinea are coming under threat from development
Most experts agree that the situation is indeed dire, although precise measurements of the rate of clearing are difficult to obtain. Approximately half of all the original rain forests may already be gone, and much of the remainder.is threatened. Estimates that were widely circulated in 1990 declared that, during the previous decade the area of rain forests lost worldwide each year was as large as the country of Belarus or the US state of Kansas, or twice the size of the Philippine island of Luzon. Critics, questioning the accuracy and consistency of the data, called these figures inflated. Although no one disputed that the extent of deforestation was great, some pointed hopefully to a recent slowdown in Ihe rale of destruction But subsequent data supports the claim that the felling and burning are again growing worse.
Because of tropical deforestation, the Amazon has become the focus ol international attention a subject of magazine articles and television documentaries, a theme of convocations of environmentalists and policy-makers the governments of developing countries that contain rain forests have become understandably sensitive to criticism from abroad. After all. they argue, the industrialized nations of the temperate zones leveled their own forests on their march to development Worse, these same nations now finance extensive logging schemes in the tropics, and they provide lucrative markets that drive rain forest exploitation They compel developing nations to liquidate their forests inorder to repay staggering international debt and they continue to plunder Ihe remaining forests within their own borders
In the Temperate Zones
It seems likely that 75 per cent of the world forests that existed before the advent of agriculture are now either cleared or degraded Proportionally, the greatest loss has been in the formerly extensive deciduous and mixed forests of temperate Eurasia and North America Agricultural lands, cities, and suburbs have permanently supplanted most of these forests In the United Kingdom for example, less than one-tenth of the land remains fotested, and eastern China has been almost entirely laid bare
Some parts of the Temperate Zone again support a cover of trees, but these are loo often plantationsof one or a few species valued by commercial foresters Such tree farms, especially those planted with introduced species, are inferior to the complex, species-rich primary forests they replace Even when foresters use native species, selective replanting diminishes natural diversity, as in many of the forests of Germany, where economically valuable spec les such as Norway spruce and Scots pine are grown instead of beech oak. hornbill and other components of the original forest
Ironically, "afforestation" Ethe creation of artificial tree plantations, frequently on land that lost its native forests long ago may be as responsible as deforestation for the declining populations of many European birds.
Where mature second-growth forests grow again, as in New England and elsewhere in the northeastern United States, a new threat looms. Sub urbanization and resort development lead to fragmentation of the forests into an archipelago of isolated woods too small to support certain wide-raining native species Forest subdivision also permits easy access by invasive weeds and by opportunistic pests and predators such as cowbirds, crows, feral cats, and raccoons, which are responsible for the drastic decline in the numbers of migratory songbirds that depend on intact forests for successful nesting.
The felling of the temperate deciduous forests was thorough Intensive logging of the temperate rain forests of Pacific North America is more recent case of this. The cutting of ancient forests of redwoods, spruces. Douglas firs, and other conifers has generated an emotional debate between environmentalists, industry representatives, economists, and politicians in the United States and Canada In Ihe early 1990s. widely disseminated satellite photos revealed a degree of forest clearing In the Cascade Range of the United Stales that dwarfed the much publicized cutting of the Amazon forests. Similar controversy surrounds the logging of the once great southern beech forests of New Zealand. Tasmania, and southern Chile
Nor have the extensive boreal forests that ring the Northern Hemisphere proved Immune to Ihe pressures of commercial logging. Large-scale industrial forestry prevails in parts of Canada and Alaska. The original forests of Scandinavia have been replaced almost entirely with plantations: many of them are simplified tree farms that grow just a few species.
On top of the toll that cutting and burning take, people contribute to deforestation by inadvertently transporting disease-causing organisms and Insect pests around the world In North America alone, a fungal blight infecting nursery stock imported from Japan wiped out Ihe magnificent chestnut that once dominated the eastern deciduous forests, an introduced baik beetle spread another devastating fungus among American elms, and the caterpillar of the European gypsy moth periodically defoliated millions of broadleaf trees Conversely, native pines in Japan are victims to Ihe pinewood nematode a type of roundworm from North America.
Finally, people produce changes Io the atmosphere itself, and these may cause forest trees to starve, sicken, and even die This takes place mainly in the developed nations of Eurasia and North America, but also where local pollution Is severe, acid rain and increased levels of ozone and heavy metals in the air can send forests into sleep decline. In central Europe, the Appalachian Mountains ol the United States, and other regions where fog or clouds laden with pollutants regularly soak the forests, Ihe phenomenon of Waldsterben "forest death" In German thas spread rapidly since 1980.
After this gloomy catalog of forest ills, can there be any good news? Fortunately, appreciation of the incalculable value ol extensive tracts of healthy native forests seems no longer restricted to environmentalists Expressions of concern may be as grand and visionary as the official resolutions of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro or as local and pragmatic as Ihe replanting of greenbelts, the adoption of new. less destructive logging pract s, and the setting aside of extractive reserves Conservationists In developed nations are arrange ; to assume the discounted debts of developing nations In return for improved natum protection, and groups such as the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO). a consortium of consumer and producer nations, cooperate to devise more rational and sustainable forestry practices.
In India, villagers have formed Chipko Andolan, a movement that protects existing forests and promotes the reforestation of logged areas. In Burkina Faso. Ethiopia and elsewhere in Africa south of the Sahara, the introduction of simple mud-and-straw or metal stoves that burn wood more efficiently promises to slow the culling of forests for fuel Other forests are spared by the growing use of solar stoves in tropical America and In China of stoves fueled by methane derived from decomposing garbage In Ihe United Slates, an ethic of "reduce reuse, and recycle" Is beginning to rein in the extravagant consumption and disposal of paper and other wood produc Is by a population that leads the world In the demands It places on natural resources And In Peru. Manu National Park has been declared a World Heritage Site in recognition of the glorious blo-diversity of Its rain forests.