In Central America, two-thirds of the natural bird habitat is threatened with extinction.
One reason for this is that a large part of drug smuggling takes place in the forests to avoid detection, according to a new report.
A new report from Nature sustainability shows unexpected consequences of the drug trade on biodiversity. The smugglers in Central America have moved their smuggling into the forests to avoid detection by the authorities, which in turn leads to deforestation.
The movement tends to take place in the forests that have the highest conservation value, says the report’s lead author Amanda D Rodewall, professor at Cornell’s ornithology lab, in The Guardian.
– It affects both the most vulnerable human and non-human populations, she says.
Affects indigenous people
Millions of hectares of forest have been destroyed by the runways and roads built to smuggle narcotics, but the indigenous people to whom the forest belongs are also affected. They are forced to accept payment from the drug dealers and agree to their terms for the drug smuggling.
– If they resist, their land is taken and violence often follows. For those not forcibly displaced, the only remaining options are to cooperate or flee across international borders, said co-author of the report, Nicholas Magliocca, of the University of Alabama.
67 bird species are at risk of extinction
The survey also shows that it has effects on the local bird population. As many as 67 species of birds that raise young in North American forest areas and winter in Central America are at risk of extinction.
The yellow-cheeked wood warbler is particularly threatened because 90 percent of the population lives in forests that are at risk of being used for drug smuggling. Even the Canada vireon has 70 percent of its forest under threat.
In Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua, approximately 15-30 percent of all deforestation that takes place can be directly linked to the smuggling and trade of cocaine.