2. What is deforestation. Deforestation is the loss of forest habit due to natural or human related causes, some of these causes include: Agriculture, mining, and cattle farming all contribute to human caused deforestation. Natural deforestation can be linked to tsunamis, forest fires, volcanic eruptions, glaciation and desertification.
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5. These fires often go out of control and spread to other areas of forest that were not meant to be cleared.
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7. Facts A typical four square mile patch of rainforest contains as many as 1,500 flowering plants, 750 species of trees, 400 species of birds and 150 species of butterflies. Originally, 6 million square miles of tropical rainforest existed worldwide. But as a result of deforestation, only 2.6 million square miles remain. Every second, a slice of rainforest the size of a football field is mowed down. That equals 86,400 football fields of rainforest per day, or over 31 million football fields of rainforest each year. In the Brazilian Amazon 60-70% of deforestation results from cattle ranches while the rest mostly results from small-scale agriculture. The world’s total forest area is just over 4 billion hectares (15,444,086 sq. miThe net loss of forests (when the sum of all gains in forest area is smaller than all losses) for 2000-2010 period was 5.2 million hectares (20,077 sq. mi.) per year.
