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Tropical Forests: The Main Deforestation Fronts*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

Norman Myers
Norman Myers
Affiliation:
Consultant in Environment & Development, Upper Meadow, Old Road, Headington, Oxford OX3 8SZ, England, UK.
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Extract

Tropical moist forests are being depleted at an ecobiome-wide rate of c. 2% per year. Certain countries are losing very little forest, while others are losing it at a rate of twice the average, and a few at a rate several times higher. An initial assessment of 14 ‘deforestation fronts’ — being areas that feature the most intensive, widespread, and rapid, deforestation — reveals that they currently feature 43% of all deforestation in 25% of tropical moist forests' expanse.

There is urgent need for additional documentation of these deforestation fronts, and to monitor their evolving status — especially of those that look likely to lose forest cover at ever-more rapid rates. Even more important, the analysis allows us to derive criteria for major foci of deforestation, thus enabling us to anticipate new fronts while they are still emergent. In turn, this affords opportunity for preventive measures in the form of ‘silver bullet’ strategies on the part of conservationists, forestry experts, land-use planners, and policymakers. An early-warning system would go far towards supplying us with a more substantive and methodical understanding of depletive processes overtaking tropical forests.

Type
Main Papers
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 20 , Issue 1 , Spring 1993 , pp. 9 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 1993

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