Trees play a vital role in the equilibrium of the ecosystem. Deforestation is a process of cutting trees to make space for pastures or for industries and households of the ever-increasing human population. Excessive cutting of trees for urban use and other purposes is detrimental to the environmental balance. It is needless to say that deforestation has several adverse effects on the environment. I am sure you would like to read more about the causes and effects of deforestation.

One of the major disadvantages of deforestation is that it disrupts the water cycle. Trees are responsible for drawing up water from the soil and releasing moisture into the atmosphere. Deforestation causes a disturbance in the water cycle and makes the environment drier. Climate change is a severe outcome of excessive cutting down of trees. Forests lock up atmospheric carbon during the process of photosynthesis. Trees contain a major portion of carbon from the atmosphere.

Clearing of the forest cover has a contrary effect on the environment. It results in an increase in the amount of carbon and other greenhouse gases in the environment. Burning of forests results in the emission of a large amount of carbon dioxide into the air. Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases like the oxides of nitrogen and methane are known to trap atmospheric heat, thus increasing the average temperature of the Earth’s surface. This increase in the temperature near the Earth’s surface and oceans is termed as global warming.

The rise in the average temperature of our planet is bound to cause the sea level to increase. Global warming has already begun causing the melting of glaciers and of the ice at the poles, thus adding to the rise in the sea level. This phenomenon is a serious threat to the life on Earth and it is we, who need to take the right measures to prevent it from happening.

We should not forget that trees add to the biodiversity in nature. Animal life thrives on vegetation. By cutting down trees, we deprive animals of their sources of food and cause the destruction of animal life. It can lead to the extinction of a variety of animal species. Global warming that is largely caused by deforestation further endangers plant and animal life, thereby disturbing the balance in nature.

It is believed that the use of fossil fuels and the burning of oil and gas cause global warming. It is true that pollution caused by the burning of oil and gas and the release of pollutants causes global warming. But research has revealed that deforestation is one of its major causes. It is the main reason behind the rise in the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, leading to the greenhouse effect.

Extreme weather conditions, changing agricultural yields and increase in the disease vectors are some of the other effects of global warming. Deforestation, being the primary reason behind global warming, we need to show greater concern towards the felling of trees. We need to take quick measures on preventing deforestation so that we can hope for an environment conducive to live in.

Human beings always have been and probably always will be to some extent dependent on forests. Trees were their habitat, their environment, their source of food and their protection from enemies. Forests are very important to man, and other organisms, and one of the biggest problems the world is facing today is the threat of totally losing the forests due to massive deforestation and suffering the harmful effects of deforestation.

Deforestation can be defined as the large scale removal of forests. Deforestation occurs when forests are converted to non-forest areas for urbanization, agriculture, and other reasons without sufficient reforestation. It is the permanent destruction of forests and woodlands.

At present, forests are considered among the most endangered on the planet. Everyday at least 80,000 acres of forest vanish from Earth. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations show that the rates of deforestation has not abated and has actually increased by 8.5% from 2000-2005 compared during the 1990s. FAO has approximated that about 10.4 million hectares of tropical forest have been permanently destroyed from 2000-2005 compared to 10.14 million hectares in the period of 1990-2000.

The process of deforestation is often a complex pattern of progressive fragmentation of the forests. Mistakes of this sort could lead to forest destruction. Along with this destruction is the extinction of many species, heavy soil erosion, greenhouse effect, silting of rivers and dams, flooding, landslides, denuded upland, degraded watershed, and even destruction of corals along the coast.

Extinction of Thousands of Species - Destruction of the forests leads to a tragic loss of biodiversity. Millions of plants and animal species are in danger of disappearing as a result of deforestation. Tropical forests are much more biologically diverse than other forest and a very serious effect of deforestation in tropical countries is the loss of biodiversity.

Heavy Soil Erosion - One function of the forest is that its roots hold the soil in place. Without trees soil erosion and landslides easily happen. When heavy rains and typhoons come, soil is easily carried to lower areas especially to communities at the foot of the mountains.

Greenhouse Effect - Deforestation increases the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The conitnued degradation of our forest heightens the threat of global warming because the trees and other plants that takes up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to be used for photosynthesis are gone. The burning of wood or its decay contributes to the release of more carbon which combines with oxygen in the atmosphere thus increasing further the levels of carbon dioxide that causes greenhouse effect.

Silting of Rivers and Dams - Deforestation results in the silting of rivers sediments deposit which shortens its life span and clogs irrigation system. As a result of deforestation, the reservoir behind many dams are filled with sediments more rapidly than expected.

Flooding - One major importance of forest is that they absorb water quickly in great amount during heavy rains. But due to massive deforestation there are no trees to absorb the water thus resulting to the loss of many lives.

Landslides - The roots of the trees bind soil to it and to the bedroock underlying it. That is how trees prevent soil from getting eroded by natural agents like wind or water. When trees are uprooted, there will be nothing to hold the soil together thus increasing the risk for landslides which can cause seriously threaten the safety of the people and damage their properties.

Denuded Upland - After several harvests of the forest the cleared land is no longer suitable for planting trees. It has become a desert. The transformation of a forest to a semi-desert condition is called desertification.

Degraded Watershed - When forest mountains are denuded, watersheds are degraded and this leads to the loss of sustained water supplies for lowland communities. This is because trees affect the hydrological cycle. They can change the amount of water in the soil, groundwater, and in the atmosphere.

Destruction of Corals along the Coast - Coral areas are degraded and coral reefs are affected by siltation. As a result of deforestation there is an increase of flooding during the rainy seasons and decreased stream flow in dry seasons.

The forest provides us with many products and important services. It stops soil erosion, refreshes the air, and protect us from typhoons and other calamities. But if rampant deforestation is not controlled it will result to several problems. In one way or another, the denuded forests will back fire and people will certainly lose to the harmful effects of deforestation.

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My idea of the threats from human kind regarding deforestation is writen below The greatest cause of tropical rainforest destruction today comes from human activities, which, unlike natural damage, are unrelenting and thorough. Although much of this deforestation is driven by national and international economic forces, a significant proportion serves no long-term purpose; it results from subsistence activities on a local level. Many of the effects from human-induced destruction of the rainforests are probably irreversible within our time.


The role of humans in the deforestation of the world's forests is considerable and extensive. Many activities contribute to this loss including subsistence activities, oil extraction, logging, mining, fires, war, commercial agriculture, cattle ranching, hydroelectric projects, pollution, hunting and poaching, the collection of fuel wood and building material, and road construction. Under current practices, extractive industries (timber, oil, and mineral) promote the development of short term booms that encourage permanent settlement. These booms and resulting settlements can attract large numbers of poor seeking a better life. They clear the surrounding land for agriculture and livestock. Meanwhile, the forest resource, whether it be oil, timber, or minerals, is rapidly depleted with little consideration for the long-term consequences. Once the resource is exhausted, the industry moves on to new areas, leaving behind settlements dependent on the resource extraction for survival and a degraded environment. The only resort for the settlers is to practice subsistence agriculture by clearing what forest remains. Most extractive processes in the rainforest are not sustainable as currently practiced.

Rainforests play the important role of locking up atmospheric carbon in their vegetation via photosynthesis. The vegetation and soils of the world's forests contain about 125 percent of the carbon found in the atmosphere. When forests are burned, degraded, or cleared, the opposite effect occurs: large amounts of carbon are released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide along with other greenhouse gases (nitrous oxide, methane, and other nitrogen oxides). The burning of forests releases about two billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year, or about 22 percent of anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide.

The buildup of carbon dioxide and other gases in the atmosphere is known as the "greenhouse effect." The accumulation of these gases is believed to have altered the earth's radiative balance, meaning more of the sun's heat is absorbed and trapped inside the earth's atmosphere, producing global warming. Greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide are transparent to incoming shortwave solar radiation. This radiation reaches the earth's surface, heats it, and re-radiates it as long-wave radiation. Greenhouse gases are opaque to long-wave radiation and therefore, heat is trapped in the atmosphere. As greenhouse gases build up, this opacity is increased and more heat is trapped in the atmosphere.



The largest anthropogenic contributor to the greenhouse effect is carbon dioxide gas emissions, about 77 percent of which comes from the combustion of fossil fuels and 22 percent of which is attributed to deforestation. The final 1 percent comes primarily from energy-costly production activities like the manufacture of concrete, steel, and aluminum. The preindustrial atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide was 280 ppm, though today levels have risen to 375 ppm, a 30 percent increase. Climatologists estimate that a level pf 450 ppm—as projected for 2050—may result in an eventual 1.8-3 degrees Celsius (3.2-5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) increase in temperature. Some scientists predict that global warming will produce a sharp upswing in global temperatures followed by a deep plunge into a glacial period several thousands years from now. However, there are still a lot of unknowns about the impact of climate change.

South America, specifically Brazil, loses the most area of forest every year by virtue of the region having the largest extent of forests in the world. Between 2000 and 2005 around 4.3 million hectares of forest were cleared per year. Brazil lost about 3.5 million hectares of forest per year.

In terms of highest rate of forest loss, Central America and tropical Asia lead the pack between 2000 and 2005.

Burundi had the highest deforestation rate (23 percent) for an individual country during that period, while Nigeria lost the highest percentage (56 percent) of primary, or old-growth forest.

Why are rainforests being destroyed?

Rainforests are being destroyed for many reasons, the greatest of which is economic. Poor people living in and around forests rely on rainforests for subsistence agriculture, fuelwood collection, bush meat and more. Families need to put food on the table. Industry relies on forests to supply raw materials for production and cheap land. Some governments see forests lands as an opportunity to resettle the poor, exile troublesome groups, and grant favors to political friends

Logging, land conversion for agriculture, urban expansion, fuelwood collection and charcoal production, mining, and infrastructure projects including dams, roads and power lines, are all fueling forest loss today. In the future, climate change could well cause further damage to forest ecosystems and biodiversity.

It's easy to be complacent sitting here at home or visiting an eco-lodge somewhere, but if you look at the most recent numbers from the UN you'll see deforestation rates have actually accelerated since the close of the 1990s. Highly diverse forests are quietly giving way to small- and large-scale agriculture and scrub vegetation. The resident wildlife isn't faring well.

Climate Change
When an area of rainforest is either cut down or destroyed, there are various climate changes that happen as a result. The following is a list of the various climate changes with a brief description of why they come about.

Desication of previously moist forest soil
What happens is because of the exposure to the sun, the soil gets baked and the lack of canopy leaves nothing to prevent the moisture from quickly evaporating into the atmosphere. Thus, previously moist soil becomes dry and cracked.

Dramatic Increase in Temperature Extremes
Trees provide shade and the shaded area has a moderated temperature. With shade, the temperature may be 98 degrees Farenheit during the day and 60 degrees at night. With out the shade, temperatures would be much colder during the night and around 130 degrees during the day.

Moist Humid Region Changes to Desert
This is related to the desicaiton of previously moist forest soil. Primarily because of the lack of moisture and the inability to keep moisture, soil that is exposed to the sun will dry and turn into desert sand. Even before that happens, when the soil becomes dry, dust storms become more frequent. At that point, the soil becomes usesless.

No Recycling of Water
Moisture from the oceans fall as rain on adjacent coastal regions. The moisture is soon sent up to the atmosphere through the transpiration of foliage to fall again on inland forest areas. This cycle repeats several times to rain on all forest regions.

Less Carbon Dioxide and Nitrogen Exchange
The rainforests are important in the carbon dioxide exchange process. They are second only to oceans as the most important "sink" for atmospheric carbon dioxide. The most recent survey on deforestaiton and greenhouse gas emisions reports that deforestation may account for as much as 10% of current greenhouse gas emmisions. Greenhouse gases are gases in the atmosphere that literally trap heat. There is a theory that as more greenhouse gasses are released into the atmosphere, more heat gets trapped. Thus, there is a global warming trend in which the average temperature becomes progressivily higher.

More Desertification
According to the United Nations Enviromental Programme (UNEP) in 1977, deforestation is an important factor contributing to desertificaiton. What is unclear is how fast deserts are expanding is controversial. According to UNEP, between 1958 and 1975, the Saharen Desert expanded southward by about 100km. In 1980 UNEP estimated that desertification threatened 35 per cent of the world's land surface and 20 per cent of the world's population. Recently, groups challenged those conclusions. Some scientists claim that the conclusion were based on insufficient data. Nevertheless, desertification still threatens more and more drylands.

Soil Erosion
The relationship between deforestation and soil ersion. Deforestation is known to contribute to run-off of rainfall and intensified soil erosion. The seriousness of the problem depends much on soil characteristics and topography.

Other Effects
There many rewards such as clean air and clean water, perhaps the two most important, that forests provide. Rainforests also provide many aesthetic, recreational and cultural rewards. If the rainforests are destroyed, then these rewards dissappear. This has major social repercusions for the entire world.

The United Nations Confrence on Enviroment and Development (UNCED) in 1992 defines deforestion as "land degradation in arid, semi-arid, and sub-humid areas resulting from variuos factors including climatic variations and human activites." The effects of deforestation can be catagorized in three ways. They are: enviromental effects, local social effects, and global social effects. Many of the enviromental effects contribute to the severity of the social problems. That is why it is important to understand the enviromental effects of deforestation and how they contribute to the social effects of deforestation.


The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) defines biodiversity as "the wealth of life on Earth, the millions of plants, animals, and micro-organisms, the gens they contain and the intricate ecosystems they build into the living enviroment." Rainforest are one of the most biologically diverse regions of the world. Over a millions species of plants and animals are known to live in the forests and millions more are not classified. The unique enviroment of the rainforest allows for such biodiversity to exist.


The process of deforestation in various geographical regions is destroying this unique enviroment. Consequently, many animals and plants that live in the rainforests face the specter of extinction. The extinction of the plants and animals leads to diminished gene pool. The lack of biodiversity and a reduced planetary gene pool could have many unforeseen ramifications, some of which could be fatal to the future of humanity. In addition, there are ethical, aesthetic and philosophical question regarding mankind's responsibility for other life. This issue concerns more industrialized countries in the North more than it concerns lesser developed countries in the South. This is especially true in developing countries such as Brazil. I will elaborate on that later.Another isssue that probably concerns the North more that the South is the advancement of humanity. As the planetary gene pool continues to diminish, there are less oppertunities for advancements in many fields. In particular, medicine may benefit from the cultivation of certain plants that grow only in rainforests. The medicines that come from them could cure cancer, AIDS, or other terminal deseases. Of course, that claim can easily be dismissed as speculative, given that there is little or no evidence to support it. However, it is too early to dismiss the possibility. Furthermore, if the rainforests are completely destroyed, the oppertunity to explore that possibility would be lost forever. The effect that would have on future generations is incalculable. Preserving the rainforest would leave many oppertunities in medicine and many other fields open for future generations to explore and further advance humanity.

There is at least on issue that would concern both North and South equally. That is preservation and is compatibility with forest use and management. Different people have different uses of rainforests. Indigenous people who live in the forests, as well as the non-indigenous people who live in the forests, the forest is their home, source of food, shelter, nourishment, recreation, culture, and livelihood. The forest provides the materials for thier homes, wood for their fires, the fish, the edible plants, and many more neccessities as well as amenities. Some of the non-indigenous people sell some of the forest resources for money. They do not exploit the forest because they sell commodities in limited numbers to preserve the forest resources for the future. This ensures that they can continue to make thier livelihoods by selling products from the forest.


There are people that see the forest as sources of money. These people exploit of the forest. They cut down trees for rare, exotic timber that sell at high prices. Their primary concern is profits. In the short term, they can make huge profits selling exotic timber. If this is continued for some time, eventually, there will be no more trees to cut down. People who make their living cutting and selling trees will go bankrupt. The same thing applies to gold mining and raising cash crops. In the case of cash crops, what happens is the soil, which is usually poor to begin with, further degrades until the soil is no longer good for agriculture. People who make their living off of raising cash crops are forced to move to other areas until all the soil goes bad. Then the cash corp farmer goes bankrupt.


Can all of the diverse interests, the needs of forest dwellers and the wants of big business people, be reconciled with? Is it possible to preserve enough of a rainforest while allowing parts of it to be used for commerical purposes? Are the need of the animals living in the forest a factor in this debate? Any sucessful policy of action regarding the management of rainforest must address of these questions. The matter is further complicated when the various effects a single action can have are considered. For exmaple, if too much timber is cut, the soil that once had sufficient cover to keep from going dry now gets baked in the sun, that same soil is subject to erosion, the forest becomes less capable of surviving big storms, and the whole forest begins to degrade and eventually die. That does not even consider how these effect will affect the animals living in the forest. Another example is mining for gold. The mercury that is used gets into the food chain, ultimately giving forest dwellers a case of mecury poisoning. How does mercury poisoning affect other animals or plants in the food chain? A third an final example is cash crop agriculture. First of all, clearing the timber exposes the soil to the sun and makes the soil suseptible to erosion. The soil itself is not really good for agriculture, and the soil becomes totally useless in a matter of years so the cylcle is started again. This rapid destruction of rainforest has various effect of forest dwellers and animals. None of which are good. The indigenous people and the forest dwellers do not benefit from the exploitation of the forest. Exploitation, through the destruction of the forest, destroys the source of life of the indigenous people, forest dwellers and animals that live in the forest. On the same token, the rich business man can not get what he wants if he must consider the needs of the people and animals who live in the rainforests. If he considers the need of the people and the animals, then he can not cut down all the trees he want. He might not even be able to cut trees in certain areas. That means his profits will not be as big as he can get. It is a real dilemma. Unfortunely, the trend is in favor of the rich business man.

WHAT IS CAUSIN DEFORESTATION?
I think that deforestation is caused bcause of the wrong thins what humans do and also the the NATURAL occurances on earth...On the natural side, as the tectonic plates have moved, mountains form and erode, rainfall patterns change, and forests respond to these changes over long periods of time. If a place was wet and warm enough for one type of tree, but the climate changed, such as during an Ice Age, those trees might not be able to continue to live in that place. Another tree might fare better, or none at all.

Humans, termites, woodpeckers, forest fires, wood rot, fungus, competition with other plant life for sunlight, erosion, mudslides, earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes, floods, and natural life cycles.


Human causes of deforestation mainly include
cutting trees for using the wood, called timber harvesting or logging, and
clearing forests to make way for agriculture of plants and/or animals.
Forests may be cut down to make room for expanding cities, too.
When people need to expand their space they tear down unused places, rip up trees from their homes, kill animals' habitats, and not even use the wood.
building new roads, cattle ranching etc.
Urban sprawl
logging
mining
infrastructure
plantation - crops
wood or timber
urbanisation
cultivation
the reason behind is the metro cities are becoming bigger and bigger day by day.the people from villages are coming to big cities because they are not getting the facilities in the villages which they need. so to make houses the trees are been cutting down, so to make houses,malls,cinemas etc. for the people.

When people cut down trees to expand land, every tree they cut down is letting out carbon dioxide that has been stored when they have done photosynthesis. Every particle of carbon dioxide that is emitted into the air adds to the ozone layer, making it thicker: this results in global warming.

What is Deforestation?


Critical to our global survival must be an emphasis upon resource depletion and environmental degradation or pollution as crucial areas for student study in the schools of the United States. This emphasis includes renewable and nonrenewable resources, resource dependence, stockpiling critical resources, recycling, and the role of commodity power in international commerce. The critical nature of this problem is related to both population growth, air quality and survival and balance of nature's creatures in the animal/insect world. While there is general recognition of such present or potential problems, there is not general agreement about what the major issues are, or what possible solutions might be offered and effectuated to solve them.

A general search of the Internet and the resources for information that it affords us can help students to zero in on the condition of the planet. Just in the one area of deforestation the sources and resources are voluminous.

Deforestation involves the permanent destruction of indigenous forests and woodlands. Much of the deforestation that is going on today is in vast areas of Africa, Latin America, and southeast Asia.

This means that deforestation includes the destruction of forests, in which the treetops touch each other to form a canopy, as well as woodlands, in which trees are spaced further apart. The term deforestation does not apply to the removal of trees from plantations or industrial forests.

Human beings have always cut down trees. Wood has historically been the most dominant form of heating fuel, as well as one of the most often used building materials for houses and ships. Twenty-five percent of the world's lumber harvest now goes towards paper production (Bryant).

No one can deny the basic human need for housing. And no one can deny that any advanced culture requires a great deal of paper to transact its daily business. However, one must also recognize the importance of forests in and of themselves.

Forests are important for several reasons. First of all, many would espouse the opinion that they should be preserved for future generations to enjoy. Certainly, the family camping trip is a true hallmark of American culture. Second of all, they provide habitat for many important species. Old growth forest in the northwestern United States is the only suitable habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl, for example. Tropical forests compose only 7% of the earth's land surface, but are home to more than half of the species on earth! (Bryant). Thirdly, forests perform important ecological functions. As aggregates of plant matter, forests do a great deal of oxygen production and help prevent excessive global warming. Additionally, forests tend to help replenish nutrients in land and thus prevent desertification. Lastly, and perhaps most obviously, we need to have forests since we rely on them as a source of timber! If we exhaust our supply of forests, we'll no longer be able to continue using them as the source of our building materials, heating fuel, and paper.

Nevertheless, deforestation is a very big and important environmental problem which is yet to be effectively addressed. According to Norman Myer, who published a book on the subject in 1979, the main causes of deforestation are excessive logging, slash and burn agriculture, cattle raising and harvesting for fuel.

Check it out:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULdaSrYGLQ

Check it out:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULdaSrYGLQ

Check it out:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULdaSrYGLQ

Check it out:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULdaSrYGLQ

Check it out:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULdaSrYGLQ