Rainforest Facts—Causes of Rainforest Deforestation
Causes of Rainforest Deforestation—the Need for Wood
Fortunately, there is no need to lose more rainforests just because we have more people and need more wood. We can now use the techniques pioneered for high-yield farming to achieve high-yield forestry. Tree plantations will further reduce tropical deforestation as the world is beginning to produce the forest products it needs from a few high-yield acres. Therefore, most of our forests can be left untouched. (A Georgia yellow pine plantation can produce 15 times as much wood as a Swedish natural forest.)[4] The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations reported a gain of 4.7 million acres of tree plantations in the tropics each year during the 1990’s.[1]
Causes of Rainforest Deforestation—The Need for Food
The world has no need to clear more forests for food. High-yield farming has tripled the yields of most crops since the 1950s.[5] We are currently feeding a better diet to twice as many people from the same cropped area we used 40 years ago.[6] Biotechnology promises to accelerate the momentum in breeding still higher-yielding seeds. However, large population increases in the developing world will strain resources and the development of new technologies is vital to boost agricultural productivity.
The development of acid-tolerant crop varieties is an example of recent technological advances. These new varieties can now produce good crops from the southern hemisphere’s one billion acres of acid savannas. These savannas, covered with brush and grass, have little biodiversity, and could be far more productive in agriculture than the rainforests that are so rich in species. Unfortunately, depressed economics in some countries have failed to provide enough off-farm jobs. Too many discouraged families have turned, instead, to the harsh life of rainforest subsistence farming. In this case, the problem is not food but a lack of economic growth.
Much of the rainforest acreage converted to agriculture becomes unproductive after three or four years because of the loss of nutrients in the soil. Though some of this acreage remains abandoned, shifting cultivation turns some land into managed forest fallows. The official numbers reporting the balance between forest acres lost and gained miss these additions to the total forest acreage.[1] Also missing in the statistics are the millions of trees outside forests that are planted and tended each year by rural inhabitants.[1]
In contrast to efforts to meet agricultural needs, the unsustainable, often illegal, hunting of wild animals for meat and other products in tropical forests is an alarming issue. Data studies support the concern that wildlife is being drastically reduced, especially in Africa, thus threatening the ecological integrity of the rainforest.[1]
Trade Barriers
Freer trade in farm products could reduce tropical deforestation. Farm trade may in fact be the most critical policy to save the environment. Present international trade rules favor national food self-sufficiency. The problem is that the world’s farming resources are not well distributed for the needs of the 21st century. Asia in 2050 will be nine times as densely populated as North America.[7] Moreover, Asia has already developed a much larger proportion of its agricultural potential than the rest of the world. This is a major reason why tropical deforestation in Asia is at a much higher rate than Latin America or Africa.
Amazon Rainforest Deforestation | U.S. Beef Consumption
Tropical Deforestation | Causes of Rainforest Deforestation
Beef Production | Rainforest Deforestation to Raise Beef Cattle
Amazon Deforestation | Rainforest Preservation | Solutions to Rainforest Deforestation
