World forest cover decreased by over 60% in 6 decades – Study

JAPAN: The global forest area per capita has decreased by over 60 per cent over the past 60 years, a loss that threatens the future of biodiversity and impacts the lives of 1.6 billion people worldwide, according to a study.

The research, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, found that the global forest area has declined by 81.7 million hectares from 1960 to 2019, with gross forest loss outweighing gross forest gain.

The researchers from the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute (FFPRI) in Japan used global land use dataset to examine how global forests have changed over space and time.

They found that decline in global forests combined with the increase in global population over the 60-year period has resulted in a decrease of the global forest area per capita by over 60 per cent, from 1.4 hectares in 1960 to 0.5 hectares in 2019.

“The continuous loss and degradation of forests affect the integrity of forest ecosystems, reducing their ability to generate and provide essential services and sustain biodiversity,” the researchers said.

“It also impacts the lives of at least 1.6 billion people worldwide, predominantly in developing countries, who depend on forests for various purposes,” they said.

The results also showed that the change in the spatiotemporal pattern of global forests supports the forest transition theory, with forest losses occurring primarily in the lower-income countries in the tropics and forest gains in the higher-income countries in the extratropics.

– NDTV