Tropical Deforestation Problems and Solutions

1
Tropical DeforestationProblems and Solutions

• Ji-woong Kim

2
Part IUnderstanding Tropical Rainforest
3
Understanding Tropical Rainforest

• Tropical Rainforest refers to a tropical and
  subtropical biome which is found around
  equatorial and subtropical regions.

• Location the regions with perennially warm,
  humid climates and high precipitation.

• Only about 6 of the earths surface is
  covered with tropical rainforest. It includes
  Amazon, C. America, Equatorial Africa, etc.

4
Distribution of Tropical Rainforest
Central America
South East Asia
Equatorial Africa
Amazon
5
Defining Deforestation

• Deforestation refers to the complete destruction
  of forest coverit means that the land is
  converted permanently from forest uses to
  non-forest purposes.(Malcolm Gillis, President
  of Rice University)

• It is certainly not a recent phenomenon as our
  ancestors cut down and damaged forests for many
  different purposes as well.

6

• The rate of deforestation, however, has recently
  accelerated to an alarming level due to the
  penurious economic conditions in developing
  countries and increasing demands for wood
  supplies from the developed nations.

• Tropical rainforests in the world initially
  covered 15 million square km, but have been
  reduced to 7.5 million square km.

7
(No Transcript)
8
(No Transcript)
9

• Destruction of these forests is fatal to us
  because they play influential and indis-pensable
  roles on the earth. Deleterious consequences of
  the destruction of the tropical rainforest are
  the following

10
1. Tropical rainforest deforestation can result
in possible changes in climate and different
cycles.

• Trees maintain the solar radiation balance by
  absorbing albedo from the sun.

• Approximately 40 of the oxygen is provided by
  the rainforests in the world.

• Trees decrease the level of carbon dioxide in the
  atmosphere. In other words, the deforestation
  contributes to the greenhouse effect and global
  warming.

11
(No Transcript)
12

• The burning of the trees contribute to the
  increase of CO2 level in the atmosphere. 20 of
  global increase in CO2 is caused by the
  destruction of rainforests.

• maintains global precipitation patterns
  (distribution of water supply) as water that is
  evaporated from the rainforest falls as rain in
  other regions. Without the tropical rainforests,
  the hazard of desertification will increase in
  many areas.

13
2. Tropical deforestation can destroy myriad
plant and animal species.

• Tropical rainforest contains undoubtedly the
  worlds largest gene pool. Its bio-diversity is
  so great that at least 50 of the earths species
  are living in it.

• Deforestation destroys the ecosystem that is
  necessary for these species to live. The
  simplification of such a diverse gene pool will
  threaten stability for life on the planet.

14
About 137 species are disappearing worldwide each
day!!
15
3. Tropical deforestation can have detrimental
effect on the local indigenous native people.

• Many Natives in the Amazon basin depend on their
  environment for survival. Hence, deforestation
  will have deleterious effects on their life style
  and culture.

16
Part IIProcess and Causes of Deforestation
17
Process and Causes

• Despite these deleterious consequences of
  deforestation, people cut down tropical
  rainforests for many different reasons.

• Studying the process (the ways in which
  deforestation occurs) will enable us to discover
  the main cause and to arrive at possible
  solutions to the problem.

18
How Deforestation Occurs

• Slash-and-burn agriculture

• The agricultural technique practiced by the
  penurious farmers in these regions. They burn a
  small portion of forest, and plant crops on the
  nutrient-rich ash. The fertility of the soil,
  however, does not last long, so the farmers
  abandon the land and burn different trees.
  Continuation of such a practice has proven to be
  detrimental.

19

• Surprisingly, it is estimated that nearly 2/3 of
  global deforestation is caused by these poor,
  individual farmers.

20

• Plantation farming

• The tropical rainforest is replaced by cash crop
  fields which can provide the country more
  revenues. Cash crops include rubber, coffee, and
  tea. It significantly reduces the diverse gene
  pool of the tropical rainforest as cash crop
  fields tend to be monotonous.

21

• Commercial logging

• Countries like Brazil and Indonesia are cutting
  down the trees to sell the lumber to the
  developed countries. Consumers in relatively
  affluent countries have high demands for
  good-quality timbers hence, developing countries
  are encouraged to cut more trees to make more
  revenues.By doing so, developing countries
  attempt to enhance their economic conditions.

22

• Cattle ranching

• Some countries cut down the forests to make room
  for cattle.

23

• Fuel wood and other domestic uses

• Trees are still the important fuels for cooking
  and other domestic uses in developing countries.
  Hence, many trees are cut down and burnt by local
  people.

24
(No Transcript)
25
Cause of Deforestation

• All the factors that are mentioned so far are
  fundamentally caused by poverty of the developing
  countries where tropical rainforests in the world
  are located.

• It means that prosperity will reduce the economic
  pressure on governments, preventing them from
  cutting down too many trees for commercial
  purposes.

26

• The studies revealed that stabilized economy and
  food consumption rate can enhance the effect of
  education.(Food for Thought. The Economist.
  2004.08)

• Education and introduction of efficient
  technology will prevent slash-and-burn
  agriculture and woods from being used as domestic
  fuels. Moreover, stable economy tends to halt the
  rapid growth of population. Thus, developing
  countries will not have to clear their forests
  for cattle ranching.

27
Opposing Perspectives

• Governments of the developing countries and
  logging companies argue that their prosperity
  relies on continuing deforest-ation. Their
  argument is justified as people and countries
  that are causing deforest-ation are mostly driven
  not by their greed but necessity. For the poor
  farmers and workers, their hunger problems are
  more imminent than environmental issues.

28

• Moreover, developing countries often have a
  tremendous amount of debts to pay back to the
  developed nations. For example, the total
  external debt owed by the developing countries
  was 2.1trillion (US) in 1996, and the sum is
  still growing.

29
Brazils Foreign Debt (1995-2004)
30
Part IIIPossible Solution for Deforestation
31
Possible Solutions

• The causers of deforestation are forced to cut
  down their trees due to their poverty. Hence, it
  is important to attack the causes of poverty to
  deal with deforestation issue.

• Unfortunately, there is no magical solution to
  the problems caused by deforestation because
  poverty is an abstruse problem to solve. However,
  we can still halt and reduce the process of
  deforestation.

32
1. Active financial aid to the developing
countries and their penurious people.

• Developing countries huge national debt,
  educational problems, and overpopulation issues
  trigger them to seek economic solutions that
  depend on exporting their resources (i.e.
  tropical rainforest).

33

• Developed nations have already begun to launch
  debt-for-nature campaign in which they bought
  debts from Brazil for preserving their Amazon
  forest.

• However, if a direct financial aid is given to
  these countries in return for saving their
  forest, the process of deforestation will be
  halted even further.

34
2. Introducing efficient modern technologies to
developing nations.

• Introduction of efficient alternative for fuel
  woods can reduce the rate of deforestation.

• For example, Mike Hands, a British ecologist, has
  found an effective and proven alternative which
  can replace slash-and-burn farming in the
  developing nations. However, few people are aware
  of this, and thus, this method is not used much.

35

• If we propagate modern technologies and farming
  techniques to the tropical region, we can reduce
  the rate of deforestation significantly.

36
3. Changing our own luxurious lifestyle.

• Countries like Brazil are cutting down trees to
  supply meat (cattle grazing) and hard-woods to
  satisfy the demands from the developed nations.
  Therefore, reducing our superfluous demands for
  such products can discourage the process of
  deforestation.

37
4. Restoration of deforested regions
agroforestry

• Though restoring the deforested area is expensive
  and difficult, the planting of fruits and
  selected hardwoods can be economically beneficial
  for the developing countries.

38
Part IVConclusion
39

• Deforestation is a serious global issue, and we,
  as global citizens, should be aware of the
  problem. Deforestation has been conducted for
  centuries and will not be solved overnight.
  Lumber products are certainly essential in our
  lives, so the complete banning of deforestation
  is rather unrealistic. Instead, we should focus
  on solving its fundamental cause poverty in the
  developing nations.

40

• We will be able to gradually decrease the rate of
  deforestation, thereby diminishing the
  environmental threat. The important factor, which
  will determine the success of halting
  deforestation, is our attitude and determination.
  Therefore, we will only be able to effectively
  stop the process of deforestation by
  understanding the issue.

41
Bibliography

• Birchall, Gary and John McCutcheon. Planet earth
  A Physical Geography. Toronto John Wiley Sons,
  1993.
• Dunlop, Stewart and Michael Jackson.
  Understanding Our Environment. 2nd Ed. Toronto
  Oxford University Press, 1997.
• Food for thought. The Economist July 31 Aug
  6, 2004 67-69
• Gillis, Malcolm. "Tropical Deforestation." 1996
  Rice Environmental Conference, February 22, 2000.
  lthttp//space.rice.edu/hmns/dlt/Gillis.htmlgt
• Kingsnorth, Paul. Global Rescue Repulsing the
  Logging Invasion of Tas-manias Wet Eucalypt
  Forest. The Ecologist Dec. 2004 Jan. 2005
  48-55.
• Nasmyth, Greg. Amazon Crime. The Ecologist
  Online. January 05, 2004.
• lthttp//www.theecologist.org/archive_detail.asp?c
  ontent_id276gt
• Roper, John. Deforestation Tropical Forests in
  Decline. CFAN, August 31, 2003.
  lthttp//www.rcfa-cfan.org/english/issues.12.htmlgt
• Staples, Sarah. Canadas Boreal Forests Valued
  at 3.7 Trillion. The Vancouver Sun 25 November
  2005 A18
• "Tropical Deforestation." Earth Observatory.
  NASA, Undated.
• lthttp//earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Library/Deforest
  ationgt

42
Thank you