Deforestation: the area of ​​forest per inhabitant has decreased by 60%!

Deforestation the area of ​​forest per inhabitant has decreased by

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In France, since the start of themeteorological summer — understand from 1er June — some 40,000 hectares of forest went up in smoke. This is incredibly more than the less than 2,000 hectares burned at the same period in 2021. But infinitely less than the 81.7 million hectares of forest that disappeared in the world between 1960 and 2019.

According to the calculations of researchers from Center for Biodiversity and Climate Change, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute (FFPRI, Japan) and given the parallel increase in world population, the forest area per inhabitant has thus decreased by more than 60% over the same time interval. It was 1.4 hectares in 1960. It was only 0.5 hectares in 2019.

A forest transition in progress

Beyond the direct loss in biodiversity represented by the deforestationremember that the forest also contributes to limiting the anthropogenic global warming by sequestering part of our emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2). To be more down to earth, the forest also supports at least 1.6 billion people in the world…

The researchers also confirm the theory that a forest transition is underway. They point out that the losses today occur mainly in low-income countries. On the side of tropics. In higher income countries, on the other hand, in the extratropics, forest gains are observed. Hence the need, on the one hand, to support low-income countries to help them improve their capacity to minimize their forest losses. And on the other hand, to encourage high-income countries to reduce their dependence on imported tropical forest products.

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