According to researchers, the Earth has lost a tropical forest equivalent to the size of England last year – the third largest decline since 2001.
It is estimated that the pace of loss is equivalent to that of 30 football fields every minute, at 12 million hectares a year.
Indonesia, however, has managed to reduce deforestation significantly, down to 3,400 km2 in the year 2018 – a 63 per cent drop since 2016. In 2015, massive forest fires occurred in the islands of Sumatra, Borneo and several others areas, engulfing about 20,000 km2 of rainforest, causing pollution at home and in neighbouring countries.
It is estimated that nearly a third of primary forest destruction took place in Brazil (13,500 km2) in 2018, followed by the Democratic Republic of Congo (4,800 km2), Indonesia (3,400km2), Colombia (1,800 km3) and Bolivia (1,500 km2). High levels of deforestation were also observed in Malaysia and Madagascar last year.
Source: Channel News Asia
Image: BBC