Defunding Deforestation

The Earth loses 18.7 million acres of forests per year, which is equal to 27 soccer fields every minute, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). It will take less than 100 years to destroy all the rainforests on the earth, and up to 28,000 species are expected to become extinct by the next quarter of the century due to deforestation. Deforestation will cause a rapid increase in global warming and requires immediate defunding and removal of big corporate companies from cutting down forests. Deforestation deprives the rainforests of many portions of it's canopy. The canopy layer blocks the sun's rays during the day, and holds heat during the night. The lack of forest canopies causes extreme temperature malfunctions that are harmful to plants and animals. In the rainforest, most plants and animals are not found on the forest floor, but in the canopy layer. The canopy is made up of the overlapping branches and leaves of the rainforest trees. Scientists estimate that sixty to ninety percent of life in the rainforest is found in these trees, making it the richest habitat for plants and animals. The relocation of animals to make way for land development rarely succeeds and could be driving some species towards extinction (Oliver Milman, www.TheGuardian.com). Many well-known animals including monkeys, lizards, birds, snakes, and sloths are found in the canopy layer. Many animals have adapted to living in the canopy, and have never even touched the ground. Deforestation has caused my animals to relocate from the canopy layers and into habitats that they are not adapted to, which could lead to species extinction.

Trees play a critical part in absorbing all of the greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming. Loss of forests contribute as much as thirty percent of global greenhouse gas emissions each year. Trees capture the carbon dioxide through a process known as photosynthesis; they then store the carbon in their bodies. When trees die, they release all of the collected carbon back out into the atmosphere. The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that U.S. forests absorb between one million and three million metric tons of carbon dioxide each year, perhaps offsetting between 20 percent and 46 percent of the country's greenhouse-gas emissions (Toni Johnson, www.cfr.org). Trees are essential in preventing enormous amounts of carbon from reaching the atmosphere. With deforestation, more and more amounts of carbon is being released, steadily increasing holes in the Ozone layer. Deforestation also causes runoff to get into bodies of water. This causes natural waters to be polluted by agricultural chemicals. Whenever deforestation occurs, the soil beneath it becomes loose, and then washes away into rivers and lakes from heavy rain. This is bad for indigenous tribes of rainforests and animal life being that they can no longer drink the water due to the pollution that man-made deforestation has caused. This problem is especially more significant when the polluted water has reached the ocean having deadly results on ocean life. As the suspended particles reach the ocean, the water becomes cloudy, causing regional declines in coral reefs, and affecting coastal fisheries (Rhett Butler, www.mongabay.com). Coral reefs support many of the ocean's organisms including 4,000 species of fish and 800 other species of the ocean's marine life. When deforestation causes pollution to runoff into the ocean, there is an increased danger to these coral reefs.

Cite this page