Deforestation - Is the sun setting for our forests?

Deforestation is the amputation of trees from forest areas more swiftly than they can be replanted or regenerate naturally. The fact that trees play an incredibly momentous part in stabilising climate, atmospheric composition and soil structure, removing trees rapidly becomes a major problem.

There are numerous reasons behind the felling of trees by mankind. The Amazon basin is a prime example of humans exploiting rainforests. Within this tropical rainforest lie a vast variety of tree species, with many uses, giving humans even more reason to exploit this area. Timber and especially hardwoods like mahogany and ebony are being felled at an alarming rate to satisfy the needs of the swiftly developing world. Another problem for the forest areas of the world is the type of agriculture used by some peasant farmers known as “slash & burn”. This method of farming involves the burning of trees to add to the initial supply of nutrients in the soil. Over time this supply slowly wares down and so the farmer once again moves onto another plot of trees to slash and burn. This cycle is repeated over and over every time the nutrient supply becomes exhausted. As you can now figure out the forest areas (of which still remain!!) are being destroyed at a large scale and at a rapid speed.

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Underground resources such as iron and aluminium ores are used a great deal in the industries of the developing countries. To obtain and transport has to be quick, easy and the cost has to minimal. To make all these possible roads are being built through forests. These cause a great deal of damage to the forests because more trees have to be removed again to mine this merchandise. Brazil is once again a prime example of forest destruction. The population of poor shanty towns are being encouraged by the governments to move to the forested area. This once again means the felling of trees. You can work out that only 1 of the forests in the world is being destroyed by humans in so many different ways to suit their way of life. Personally I think the problem is getting so worse mankind does not even have a care for the species habiting within the forest and the actual beauty of the forest. Third world countries which don’t have enough money to turn the forests into business parks, office buildings, flats etc are still destroying forests by means of cutting down the trees to use them for fuel because the country is so poor this is the only fuel source available. The luxuries of the western world such as body creams, bath oils, sweets, fruits and nuts, etc are all used and eaten with no consideration where the origins are and what damage was caused to the environment obtaining them. As these products are becoming more and more popular the demand for them increases and so more damage has to be caused to the forest meeting this demand.

About 16-20 million hectares of tropical rainforests are removed each year!

The exclusion of hefty areas of forest has brought about a large number of adverse effects. The major effects are augmented soil erosion (which leads to increased flooding in most areas), lessening in biodiversity, the Greenhouse Effect, condensed fertility of land in deforested areas and disturbance of the hydrological cycle.

The destruction of trees increases soil erosion. It’s explained as follows; in forested areas, flood water is absorbed into soil and taken up by tree roots. The water then is transpired through aerial parts of the plant into the atmosphere, where it forms clouds and is transported to drier regions. In deforested areas, the flood water runs across the deforested area and is not stopped by vegetation. The top layer of soil is eroded during this run off process and gets transported into rivers where it causes the level of silt to rise. This rise in river level causes floods to occur more frequently. This is how the destruction of trees increases soil erosion

However, the protection which a forest gives the soil against erosion is not provided by trees but by the lower shrub layer and by the leaf litter. Raindrops falling from tree leaves have a higher kinetic energy than those falling in the open and therefore the soil would be disturbed more by the dropping of water from tree leaves than by rain if it weren't for the protective ground cover layer. A very large proportion of the water (around 75%) which reaches the soil is, however, returned to the atmosphere by the larger trees, and this is the part they play in preventing flooding.

A2 Biology- Michelle Ashcroft Zahid Akbar