Forest loss cut in half worldwide

The rate at which the world is losing its forests has halved, but an area of woodland the size of South Africa has still been lost since 1990, a UN report revealed yesterday.

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Improvement has been seen around the globe, even in the key rainforests of South America and Africa, according to a forest resources assessment the UN releases every five years.

"Even though globally the extent of the world's forest continues to decline, the rate of net forest loss has been cut by over 50%," said the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation. The assessment was released at the World Forestry Congress in Durban this week.

But environmentalists have accused the congress of blurring the differences between forests and tree plantations.

Environmentalists are pushing a programme that aims to conserve indigenous forests for "the livelihoods of communities, to promote biodiversity and mitigate climate change as opposed to the false solution represented by the establishment of more tree plantations", Greenpeace International executive director Kumi Naidoo said.

Source: The Times