Brazil top of world for deforestation

Paris – Vast tracts of pristine rainforest on three continents went up in smoke last year, with an area roughly the size of Switzerland cut down or burned to make way for cattle and commercial crops, researchers said.

Brazil accounted for more than a third of the loss, with the Democratic Republic of Congo and Indonesia a distant second and third, based on satellite data, Global Forest Watch said in its annual report.

The 38 000km2 destroyed in 2019, equivalent to a football pitch of old-growth trees every six seconds, made it the thirdmost devastating year for primary forests since scientists began tracking their decline two decades ago.

“We are concerned that the rate of loss is so high, despite all the efforts of different countries and companies to reduce deforestation,” said lead researcher Mikaela Weisse, Global Forest Watch project manager at the World Resources Institute.

The total area of tropical forest levelled by fire and bulldozers worldwide last year was three times higher, but virgin rainforests, as they were once known, are especially precious.

Undisturbed by modern development, they harbour the richest diversity of wildlife on earth and lock in huge stores of carbon.

When set ablaze, that carbon escapes into the atmosphere as planet-warming CO2.

“It will take decades or even centuries for these forests to get back to their original state” – assuming the land is left undisturbed, Weisse said.

Other countries with severe losses of primary forests were Peru (1 620km2), Malaysia (1 200km2) and Colombia (1 150km2). –