The tropics lost the equivalent of 10 soccer fields of forest per minute last year.
A quarry in the Cerro Blanco Forest the outskirts of Guayaquil, Ecuador, in April 2023. Photo: Marcos Pin/AFP via Getty Images
The tropics lost the equivalent of 10 soccer fields of forest per minute last year due to logging, human-set fires andDeclines in rainforest deforestation rates in Brazil and Colombia were counteracted by increases in other countries, which set the world further off track from meeting forest loss goals critical to curbing climate change.In total, 9.1 million acres of primary tropical forest were destroyed last year, according to the report.
While that represented a 9% decrease from losses in 2022, it was essentially on par with 2021 and 2019 figures, indicating that efforts to reduce deforestation rates are stalling. Forest loss last year generated 2.4 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, which is almost equivalent to half of the annual fossil fuel emissions of the U.S.A vast majority of tropical forest loss over the past decade has been from sources unrelated to fires, such as mechanical clearing for agriculture and logging, wind damage and river meandering.The Amazon region overall experienced last year's largest deforestation decline, with 39% less primary forest loss in 2023 than in 2022.
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