Deforestation - Blog Posts
If you write a book on the problems of deforestation and then you publish that book doesn't that make you part of the problem for deforestation?
This is a genuine question.
If you care even a little bit about climate change, animal abuse, world hunger, deforestation, human health, the oceans, you really really really need to take a long hard look at what you eat. As much as people don’t want to admit it, animal agriculture is killing the environment, animals, and humans, and the longer society refuses to admit it the more damage is going to be done.
While deforestation is a major source of global carbon emissions (see previous two posts), the expansion of agriculture into drained organic soils also releases carbon. Wetlands, and especially peatlands, have waterlogged soils. As a result, their soils are depleted of oxygen, preventing decomposition. This means that the carbon in plants and animals is stored in the soils. When these soils are drained, the oxygen returns and organic material decomposes. Decompostion releases the carbon stored in that material. Thus, draining wetland soils releases carbon dioxide and contributes to climate change.
FAO adds emissions from cropland expansion into drained organic soils to deforestation. The result: significant increases in carbon emissions from Indonesia, which has substantial peatlands.
The figures from the previous post on deforestation (from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization) have a significant impact on carbon emissions and climate change. Because deforestation releases carbon stored in plants and soils, deforestation has become a major source of global carbon dioxide emissions. Countries with greater deforestation have greater emissions as a result.
Forest conversion in Brazil 1990-2010 released 25.8 billion metric tons of CO2. The next four greatest emitters from deforestation were Indonesia, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Venezuela. Combating climate change will require reigning in deforestation.
This graph shows net forest conversion (deforestation that replaces forest with a new land use) from 1990-2010. Brazil and Indonesia stand out as the hot spots of deforestation.
In contrast, China, the United States and Vietnam experienced afforestation and reforestation.