Global Rain Forests

Tropical Forests

Rain forests, otherwise known as tropical forests, cover 6% of the planet and are home to over 50% of the world's plants and animals. Forests have always been a source of food, housing and medicines for local people. Today, the economic basis of many developing countries is created with resources that are found in tropical forests.

There are only four tropical forests that are relatively unharmed, but extremely vulnerable - Amazon, Congo, Papua New and the Guiana Shield - the home if Iwokrama. These are called "frontier forests".

Great Cause for Concern

Global rates of deforestation remain the same as ten years ago. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates the rate of South American tropical deforestation at 21,000 square miles (6.2 x 10 6 ha/yr) annually - about the size of the United Kingdom . To date, 55% of the world's tropical forests have been converted to non-forest uses.

• Unchecked, this rate of deforestation will result in the total elimination of tropical forests in 100 years. 
• Estimates of plant and animal extinctions range from one to 137 species disappearing every day.

Tropical rain forests are crucial to human survival and development. In spite of the fact that tropical forests cover such a small area of the world's surface, their loss will cause severe global changes.

Through various direct and indirect means, deforestation releases CO2 into the atmosphere increases the greenhouse effect. This in turn may raise global temperatures, causing flooding, plant and animal extinctions, loss of agricultural land, systems failures and many more consequences. Forest loss will negatively affect economies, health, cultures and political stability worldwide.

The cause of rampant deforestation is business development with little concern for social, cultural and ecological impacts set in a context of poor governance.

One of many major global challenges is the development of mechanisms for the management of tropical forests to meet the needs of local, national, and international stakeholders.