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What's Happening To Them

banner showing scenes of deforestation
Images of deforestation courtesy of Rainforest Foundation UK

Introduction

In the past 50 years, a third of the world’s rainforests have been felled and burned, and the rate of destruction is increasing [read more]

 

How much we are losing

Tropical deforestation – both wet and dry forest – amounts to 13 million hectares lost per year, 6 of which is tropical rainforests. It’s the equivalent of about 8.5 million football pitches a year, or 23, 483 pitches a day [read more]

 

Drivers of deforestation

The tropical rainforests are being cleared and degraded because of the complex interplay between various economic, social and development factors. From the point of view of the countries that own them, and from the perspective of the people who live there, the continuing clearance of the forests is often regarded as quite rational [read more]

 

Local effect, global problem

The rainforests are a complex environment essential to the stability of our planets climate and its ability to support life in its current form. In the race to understand the vast biodiversity of the rainforests before they are destroyed to the point of collapse, studies are showing that rainforest destruction has much wider implications for the earth than local habitat and species loss [read more]