Around the world we live in, many beautiful forests are being cut down for timber and pulp, cleared away to grow food and also destroyed just by the impact and changes of the climate.  Four out of the five forests that covered almost half of the Earth’s land surface eight thousand years ago have already been crucially degraded or destroyed. But Greenpeace is trying to prevent from this to continue.

Every couple of seconds, a large area size of a football pitch is lost in the forest due to logging or destructive practices. 72% of Indonesia intact forest landscapes and also 155 of the Amazon’s are already lost forever. Congo forests are about to suffer the same threat. Through agriculture and logging, mining and climate change, humankind is wiping out irreplaceable forests.

Agri-business is responsible for massive rainforest destruction as forests are cleared for palm oil or soya plantations or also burned to make way for cattle ranches. The irreplaceable rainforests are converted into products that are now used to make animal feed, toothpaste, and chocolate. Industrial logging for timber, pulp and paper has also overwhelmed much of the world’s rainforests. By building roads into pristine rainforests, the logging industry opens them up to secondary effects like hunting, fuel-wood gathering, agriculture and especially human settlement.

Rising global temperatures damage and kill trees, and increase drought and forest fires. Dying trees releases more carbon, which increases our global temperature.

Greenpeace is campaigning for zero deforestation globally by the year 2020 because protecting forests is one of the most and quickest effective ways to prevent climate change, protect the biodiversity and defend the rights of forest communities. For people to view what they view, the international community, corporations, forest communities and individuals in consumer countries will need to work together in an unprecedented, concerted effort.

Reference: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/forests/threats/
Emre: http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=4005981207763762003
Kaitlin: http://yay4bio.blogspot.com/2010/09/eight-year-old-receives-wwf-philippines.html?showComment=1305854645517#c2132544183697557941