Recent studies carried out through the analysis of satellite pictures, show that the tropical forests are fast disappearing. The most widely accepted statistics indicate that the rate of destruction is around 154,000 km2 each year – the equivalent of two soccer pitches a second. It is estimated that even more has been seriously damaged, mainly due to indiscriminate tree-felling.
South-East Asia and Africa have already lost half of their tropical forests and Central America now has only 30% of its original forests. The most serious cases of degradation are in Haiti where 98% of the tropical forests are already gone, followed by the Philippines with 97%, and Madagascar with 95%. Although the majority of the Amazon Rain Forest within Brazil is still well preserved, more that 90% of the Atlantic Forest has been destroyed.
If deforestation continues at this rate, at least one quarter of the planet’s biological diversity will be threatened in the near future. The earth has not known extinction of this magnitude for 65 million years.