Visual Thinking : Deforestation

Photo: Clear-cuts are planted with manioc, a very inefficient way to farm

Clear-cut swaths of the Amazon rain forest in Quiandeua, Brazil, are often planted with manioc, or cassava, a shrub grown for its starchy root. Farmers slash-and-burn large parcels of forest every year to create grazing and crop lands, but the forest's nutrient-poor soil often renders the land ill-suited for agriculture, and within a year or two, the farmers move on.

Photograph by Joel Sartore

Threats

Logging interests cut down rain forest trees for timber used in flooring, furniture, and other items.
Power plants and other industries cut and burn trees to generate electricity.
The paper industry turns huge tracts of rain forest trees into pulp.
The cattle industry uses slash-and-burn techniques to clear ranch land.
Agricultural interests, particularly the soy industry, clear forests for cropland.
Subsistence farmers slash-and-burn rain forest for firewood and to make room for crops and grazing lands.
Mining operations clear forest to build roads and dig mines.
Governments and industry clear-cut forests to make way for service and transit roads.
Hydroelectric projects flood acres of rain forest.

Solutions

Sustainable-logging regimes that selectively cull trees rather than clear-cut them would save millions of acres of rain forest every year.
Campaigns that educate people about the destruction caused by rain forest timber and encourage purchasing of sustainable rain forest products could drive demand down enough to slow deforestation.
Encouraging people who live near rain forests to harvest its bounty (nuts, fruits, medicines) rather than clear-cutting it for farmland would save million of acres.
Government moratoriums on road building and large infrastructure projects in the rain forest would save many acres

In Espirito Santo, stacked eucalyptus logs await pickup. Plantations of this non-native species have replaced 7.5 million acres of forest, becoming the world's biggest source of eucalyptus pulp for paper.

Photograph by Mark Moffett

Published: January 2007

Photograph by Alex Webb

Deforestation is the permanent destruction of forests in order to make the land available for other uses. An estimated 18 million acres (7.3 million hectares) of forest — roughly the size of Panama — are lost each year, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Some other statistics:

About half of the world's tropical forests have been cleared (FAO)
Forests currently cover about 30 percent of the world’s land mass (National Geographic)
Forest loss contributes between 12 percent and 17 percent of annual global greenhouse gas emissions (World Resources Institute)

Deforestation is considered to be one of the contributing factors to global climate change. Trees absorb greenhouse gases and carbon emissions. They produce oxygen and perpetuate the water cycle by releasing water vapor into the atmosphere. Without trees, forest lands can quickly become barren land.

Save the Sumatran tiger!

This one was for a Greenpeace campaign against deforestation in areas where the Sumatran tiger lives. Greenpeace tried to persuade Delhaize (an important retailer) to force their suppliers not to destroy rain forest for palm oil production.

http://www.ameliasmagazine.com/earth/ken-dumps-barbie-greenpeace%E2%80%99s-indonesia-deforestation-campaign/2011/06/27/

abigail reynolds: woodsmen, 2008. This photograph represents the impact of deforestation happening over time, as development for the human environment.