Worldwide, more than 28,000 people are killed by deforestation, the felling of trees. This is according to research published on Wednesday in scientific journal Nature Climate Change. Scientists calculated how many people from 2001 to 2020 collapsed as a result of the heat following tropical deforestation. It is the first study that connects a worldwide death rate.
In twenty years the study will reach more than half a million. Most victims fall in Southeast Asia. This concerns an average of 8 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants of areas in which a lot of deforestation takes place. In addition to Southeast Asia, this is also about tropical areas in Africa, North and South America.
The actual number of deaths is probably higher. That the temperature has risen in twenty years due to the CO2 emissions that are released during deforestation has not been included. In tropical areas, more than a third of the total heat testing is due to deforestation.
“Fantastic insights,” says Stefan Dekker, Amazon expert and director of the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) NrC. “This study shows how our health is linked to the health of the earth. Forests can literally save human lives.”
Earlier research already found that exposure to heat can be fatal, partly due to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. “This is, for example, people who work on the land all day,” explains Dekker. “Depending on, among other things, there is one seal Place in the functioning of man between 36 and 40 degrees outside, sometimes with a fatal consequence. ” A total of 345 million people in tropical areas were confronted with higher temperatures as a result of deforestation.
Local Managing of Climate
There is no complicated climatic mechanism behind saving human lives through forests. Forests simply offer shade, which ensures cooling. More evaporation also takes place in forests than elsewhere. Part of the energy then comes in that evaporation and not in temperature structure. Dekker: “Forests are also seen as a natural air conditioning.”
Moreover, they provide rain, which in turn is important for agriculture on which people depend on. In agricultural areas south of the Amazon, less rain now falls, because further down, in the Amazon, is defosed – ironically to release more agricultural land.
According to Dekker, this study shows how important the ‘room manage“Van Klimaat, which is being done more and more research. Not only at international level, measures must be taken against global warming, but also local adjustments can help to protect people. It is about creating shadow in agricultural areas.
Yet we should not see the local managing of the climate as a way to lower the global temperature, Dekker warns. The role of reforestation is large locally, but has a smaller effect on the global temperature. “To prevent climate change, we have to emit less CO2; we don’t make it with more trees of plants.”
European responsibility
Every year more than 10 million hectares of forest disappears worldwide, according to an estimate. After China in particular the European Union is responsible for the international trade that ensures deforestation, according to The World Wildlife Fund. Tropical forests are cut down for wood or agriculture, among other things. Products that result from this (palm oil, rubber, coffee and cocoa, for example) are (also) imported by Europe.
In 2017, 16 percent of deforestation was linked to European consumption. The Netherlands did not work out well: where the average European was responsible for about 5 square meters of deforestation in 12 years, 18 square meters was for the Dutchman. The EU has adopted a new default law, although it was postponed last year until the end of 2025.
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