Indonesia surpasses Brazil in deforestation rate

Recent study conducted by the journal Nature Climate Change said that the virgin forest of Indonesia which has an area of 60,000 sq. km. was already gone. The said area is almost the size of Ireland that has a span of more than twelve years.

During the year 2000 and 2012, scientists observed and checked the progress of the cleared forest in Indonesia via satellite. The image of satellite in Riau province in Indonesia displayed the reduction of wetland forest which is labeled as color red and the breakdown of forest labeled in blue throughout their study. They also added that the forest was cleared because the area will be used for different plantations just like the palm oil plantation.

In year 2012, the reduction of the main forest in Indonesia was getting higher every year and the recorded loss in that year reached an area of 8,400 sq. km. The study of University of Maryland said that the deforestation had resulted to a higher greenhouse gas emissions and a reduction of a particular habitat or ecosystem. Indonesia is recognized for its different kinds of wildlife like orangutans and Sumatran tigers.

In year 2011, the government implemented a temporary prohibition of deforestation but environmental activists said that corrupt government officials were very fast to trade off large reaped crops of rainforests for financial advantage and they argued to do more investigation to eliminate the rate of loss, according to BBC’s Karishma Vaswani.

Enormous forest fires in Indonesia to clear the land caused a huge smoke pollution that also affected the neighboring countries like Malaysia and Singapore. According to the reports of agencies, Norway contributed almost fifty million dollars to Indonesia in order to build new organizations to minimize deforestation. However, Indonesia needs to begin first the reduction of deforestation before receiving the big amount of money.

A.Phan