Global continued...
According to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 18 million acres of forest are lost every year. Half of the world’s tropical rainforests have already been cleared as of 2015. Deforestation is worldwide; however, tropical rainforests are mainly the target. At present-day, the top ten countries with highest deforestation are Brazil, Indonesia, Russian Federation, Mexico, Papua New Guinea, Peru, United States of America, Bolivia, Sudan and Nigeria. These countries are the ones with the most forest areas lost annually. Mario Rauter, Programme Manager of The Global Canopy Programme’s Drivers of Deforestation, an organization who focuses on stopping factories causing deforestation, said, “we are currently all part of a global deforestation economy. Deforestation is in our chocolate and, our toothpaste, our animal feed and our textbooks, our buildings and our furniture, our investments and our pensions,” meaning that worldwide, today, deforestation is caused by everything we do and use. It is in our economy, production and consumption of goods and services is all connected to deforestation.
Forests cover over one-fourth of the world’s total land area today. “statistics compiled by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), agriculture is the most important cause of deforestation on the planet. While Subsistence farming accounts for 46 percent of the total deforestation in the world, commercial agriculture is responsible for 32 percent. Other prominent causes of deforestation include logging at 14 percent, and fuel requirements at 5 percent.” This explains that the number one cause of deforestation is farming, followed by agriculture, then logging and lastly for fuel worldwide.