Deforestation: How server is the problem?

 Deforestation: house severe is the problem?

Deforestation rate is relatively less in temperate countries, but it is very alarming in tropical countries. The total forest area of the world in 1900 was established to be 7,000 million hectares which was reduced to 2890 million hectare in 1975 and fell down to just 2300 million hectares by 2000.we have already cut half of these forests and at the present read it is estimated that in the next 50 years we would lose more than 90% of are tropical forests.

the forested area in India seems to have established since 1982 with about 0.04% declining annually between 1982 to 90. FAO (1983) estimated that about 1.44 million hectare of land was brought under afforestation during this period leading to stabilization. As per FAO estimates, the deforestation rate per unit population in India is the lowest among the major tropical countries, despite the fact that we have a huge population size and very low per capita forest area (0.075 hectare per capita). However, we are still for behind the target of achieving 33% forest area, as per our national forest policy.

What are the major causes of deforestation?

1. Shifting cultivation: There are an estimated 300 million people living as shifting cultivators who practice slash and burn agriculture and are supposed to clear more than 5 lakh hectare of forests for shifting cultivation annually. In India, we have this practice in North East and to some extent in Andhra Pradesh, Bihar and MB which contributes to nearly half the forest cleaning annually.

2. Fuel requirements: Increasing demand for fuel wood by the growing population in India alone shot up to 300-500 million tons in 2001 as compared to just 65 million tons during independence, thereby increasing the pressure on forest.

3. Raw materials for industrial use: Wood for making boxes, furniture, railway sleepers, plywood, matchboxes, pulp for paper industry etc. have exerted tremendous pressure on forests. Plywood is in great demand for packing tea for tea industry of Assam while fir tree wood is exploited greatly for packing apples in J&K.

4. Development projects: Massive destruction of forests occur for various development project like hydroelectric projects, big dams, road construction, mining etc.

5. Growing food needs: In developing countries this is the main reason for deforestation. To meet the demands of rapidly growing population, agricultural lands and settlements are created permanently by clearing forests.

6. Overgrazing: The poor in the tropics mainly rely on wood as a source of fuel leading to loss of tree cover and the cleared lands are turned into grazing lands. Overgrazing by the cattle leads to further degradation of these lands.

7. Forest fires: These may be natural or man-made, and cause huge forest loss.

What are the consequence of deforestation?

Deforestation has far reaching consequences, which may be outline as follows:

1. It threatens the existence of many wildlife species give to destruction of their natural habitat.

2. Biodiversity is lost and along with that genetic diversity is eroded.

3. Hydrological cycle gets affected, thereby influencing rainfall.

4. Problems of soil erosion and loss of soil fertility increase.

5. In hilly areas it of the leaves to landslides.

6. More carbon is added to the atmosphere the global warming is enhanced.