The Impact of Deforestation on the Environment

Deforestation refers to the removal of trees from an area that is then converted for other purposes. Every second since 2016, a football pitch of forest has been lost around the world.¹ Expanding agriculture is largely responsible. Clearing space for grazing cattle or planting crops accounts for 80 per cent of deforestation.² The impact that deforestation has on the environment is tremendous.  

What is the impact of deforestation on the environment?

Climate change and carbon dioxide

At a global level, deforestation impacts the environment by contributing to climate change. The practice is responsible for at least 10 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions.³ This is because trees absorb carbon dioxide (CO2) as they grow and store surplus carbon in their biomass.⁴ When they are cut down and burned or left to rot, the sequestered carbon is released again.⁵ CO2 enters the atmosphere and traps heat, thereby contributing to human-caused global warming and climate change.⁶

Thanks to the stabilising effect trees have on our planet’s temperature, reducing deforestation is crucial for mitigating climate change. Cutting down trees does not simply release the carbon they have stored, it also prevents the tree from absorbing any additional CO2. 

Planting new trees and enhancing existing forests can help to address the issue of global climate change. However, it can take decades for saplings to remove considerable CO2 from the atmosphere.⁷ To prevent a global increase in temperature of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, deforestation and all types of forest loss must be massively reduced.⁸      

Loss of habitat and biodiversity in forests

Forests support an incredibly diverse array of plant and animal life, especially tropical forests. Globally, they are home to 80 per cent of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity,⁹ including undiscovered plants and animals. Deforestation threatens this by destroying their habitats and degrading the forest so that it can no longer support complex ecosystems.

Deforestation is most pronounced in the tropics, where it has consumed half of the world’s rainforests since the 1950s.¹⁰ This has caused the rate of extinction of species, including plants and animals, to explode 1,000 times higher than historic natural levels.¹¹ An estimated 137 species of insects, plants and animals die out every day due to deforestation destroying their habitat.¹² This equates to a deplorable 50,000 species going extinct each and every year.¹³

The Amazon is the world’s largest remaining rainforest. It houses at least 10 per cent of the planet’s known biodiversity.¹⁴ It is also suffering deforestation at an alarming rate. In 2020 alone, conversion to agriculture, for reasons such as palm oil plantations, led to 4,281 square miles of Amazonian forest cover being lost.¹⁵ That is equivalent in size to the entire landmass of Jamaica.¹⁶ 

More than three million species that live beneath the 634 million hectares of its canopy are under acute threat.¹⁷ When the impacts of climate and deforestation are considered together, up to 58 per cent of the Amazon’s tree species could be lost by 2050.¹⁸ Should deforestation continue at its present rate, half of this mighty rainforest would be reduced to 53 per cent of the original forest.¹⁹ The remaining half would become extremely fragmented, with just 30 per cent of forest remaining.²⁰ Such substantial forest loss would be one of the many effects of deforestation caused by human activities.

Soil erosion around the world caused by deforestation

A lesser-known impact of deforestation is soil erosion. Trees help the land to retain both water and topsoil, fundamental for sustaining any plant life.²¹ Their roots hold the soil in place and prevent it from being washed away by rain or blown away by wind.²² As a result of deforestation, however, half of the planet’s topsoil has been lost in the past 150 years.²³ The topsoil contains the nutrients necessary to regenerate future plant growth.²⁴ Land cleared by deforestation, therefore, tends to be poor, dry and nutrient deficient.²⁵

Logging companies often exacerbate the situation, as their heavy machinery compacts the already thin soil.²⁶ This further inhibits any new plant life.²⁷ Agricultural plants that often replace forests are also unable to hold the topsoil in place.²⁸ Many of these crops, including coffee, cotton, palm oil, soybeans and wheat, can worsen soil erosion.²⁹ As a result, more trees are felled to obtain more topsoil-poor land for agriculture, and the cycle of soil loss continues.

The impact of deforestation on water in the atmosphere

Another impact that deforestation has on the local environment is the amount of water in the atmosphere. Trees regulate the water cycle by taking up moisture from the ground and releasing water vapour through pores in their foliage.³⁰ Forests perform this process en masse and create clouds that can produce rainfall hundreds – or even thousands – of miles away.³¹ 

Felling trees diminishes the amount of moisture transpired and evaporated into the atmosphere. This in turn leads to reduced rainfall.³² Deforested areas have less water in the air and therefore less precipitation.³³ This engenders dryer soil and inhibits the growth of crops.³⁴ West Africa has witnessed this in recent years with disastrous consequences. 90 per cent of the region’s forest was razed over the past century.³⁵ Drought has subsequently plagued West Africa, putting 10 million people at risk of starvation in 2010.³⁶

Similarly, Colombia’s freshwater supply has suffered due to extensive deforestation of its rainforest. The country once had the second largest freshwater reserves in the world. It has since fallen to 24th, as its forest coverage has been sacrificed to agricultural land conversion. There are fears that the Amazon rainforest could be lost within 50 years, due to declining rainfall patterns induced by both global warming and deforestation.³⁷

Can we prevent deforestation?

We can hugely reduce the impact of deforestation on the environment. Changing our approach to food production is one way this can be achieved. Just four commodities, beef, soy, palm oil, and wood products, are behind the majority of tropical deforestation.³⁸ Land conversion continues to threaten the Amazon because of the global demand for beef and soy.³⁹ More than 80 per cent of all soybean crops are fed to livestock.⁴⁰ By reducing our meat intake, we can curtail the rate of deforestation in the Amazon. 

Similarly, palm oil is driving much of Southeast Asia’s deforestation.⁴¹ Yet, palm oil is an extremely land-efficient crop, six to 10 times more efficient at producing oil than temperate oilseed crops.⁴² By purchasing products with the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil certification, we can avoid contributing to deforestation.⁴³  

It is shocking that agriculture drives 80 per cent of deforestation.⁴⁴ But, this means that by changing our behaviour as consumers, we can make a huge difference to the world’s climate. We can help to prevent this environmentally devastating practice before it is too late.

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