HUMAN IMPACT IN FOREST
“THE CLEAREST WAY INTO THE UNIVERSE IS THROUGH A FOREST WILDERNESS”
During the starting of the 20th century, approximately 31 million square miles of the land was a forest. But now, this number has decreased to less than 25 million square miles. Much of this decline can be attributed to expanding agricultural land use and increasing demand for wood and forestry products. Desserts, farmlands, and urban areas are increasingly around the world and while some countries are rapidly removing turns in the name of development. As the world faces severe effects of climate change, wildlife intinction, trees inevitably hold a significant part of the answer to these problems.
We all know that deforestation is a universal problem. And it is so evident that the main reason for this destruction is because of humans.
Only a tiny fraction of native forest cover remains now across the world. Farming, grazing of livestock, mining etc., account for more than half of all deforestation. Forestry practices, wildfires and urbanization account for the rest. This wide range of human activities resulted in climatic change, deforestation, desertification, industrialization, urbanization and other socio-economic activities. Some of the major impacts of humans on the forest are Deforestation, Habitat Fragmentation, Planting of Non — Native trees, and Overgazing.
What is Deforestation?
Deforestation refers to reducing forest areas across the planet that are lost for other uses like urbanization, agricultural croplands or mining activities. Greatly accelerated by human activities, deforestation has negatively affected natural ecosystems, biodiversity, and climate.
Why Is Deforestation Happening?
Various factors, either of human or natural origin, cause deforestation. Biological and Environmental factors include parasite caused diseases or natural forest fires which may result in deforestation. However, human activities are among the leading causes of global deforestation. The construction of infrastructures such as roads or dams and mining activities and urbanisation makes up the remaining causes of deforestation.
Agriculture can be considered as one of the significant causes of deforestation. Peasants clear the forest areas, and they start to develop agricultural settlements. The construction of human infrastructures has also been paving the way for deforestation. More specifically, 10% of deforestation are often attributed to new infrastructures that serve the current human lifestyle in three main ways: transportation, transformation and energy generation.
The populational shift from rural areas to urban areas is also a reason for deforestation. As the population increases, the urban areas is also contributing to deforestation. As the cities become larger, they want to host more people, they challenge the natural boundaries surrounding them, often leading to deforestation. And as cities become larger so they can host more people, they challenge the natural boundaries surrounding them, often leading to deforestation. This is one of the most reasons why deforestation is happening. In order to meet up the basic needs of the population, the present society has undertaken a series of steps like rapid industrialisation, urbanisation, deforestation, overexploitation of natural sources, etc. The outcomes of the above human activities have contributed significantly to the degradation of the environment around us.
Forest fragmentation is another threat to the forest. The breaking down of huge, contiguous forested areas into smaller forest patches is separated by roads, agriculture, utility corridors, or other anthropological developments. Forest Fragmentation may be a gradual process that starts with smaller, discontinuous patches in an otherwise unbroken forest or grassland. When the forests are highly fragmented, the remnants’ size, integrity, and connectivity deteriorate beyond, making the area not a good home for the native plants and wildlife. Forest fragmentation is often induced by natural causes like lava flows and other natural calamities or artificial causes like converting forests to farmland and infrastructure. In general, fragmentation ends in biodiversity loss by reducing forest health and degrading habitat, increases in invasive plants, pests, pathogens, and water quality reduction. The ecological effects of fragmentation are primarily adverse on all taxa. They need to be ranged from habitat loss, reduction in species richness of plants and animals alterations to social systems, and metapopulation dynamics.
The planting of non-native species is another kind of impact by humans on forestry. Non-native species are harmful to natural resources because they disrupt natural communities and ecological processes. The non-native species can’t compete with the native species and habitats, which cause their extinction. Non-native plants are capable of causing extinctions of native plants and animals, reduce biodiversity, compete with the native organism for limited resources, and alter habitats.
Overgrazing happens typically when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for longer periods or without sufficient recovery periods. Either livestock often causes it in poorly managed agricultural applications, game reserves, or nature reserves. Overgrazing may be a significant environmental problem where groups of animals feed excessively from one land area without fully recovering the vegetation therein place. It’s a phenomenon that will be seen both within nature but also on livestock farms. It usually happens when a farmer or an owner of the livestock keeps too many animals in one secluded area. Unfortunately, overgrazing has many negative effects on native species, including erosion, land degradation and loss of valuable species. Overall, there are many negative impacts of overgrazing for native species. While a number of the ways to stop overgrazing include proper animal management, better land management, and sustainable pasture practices, they’re often not performed. However, these are essential steps require to preserve the standard of the land for future generations.
Over the past twenty years, the human impact on wildlife is seen worldwide. Forests are diminishing at an alarming rate. Deforestation is becoming more of a problem day by day. We’ve harmed and destroyed forest ecosystems and everything that lives in them throughout the years, so it’s only reasonable that we do everything we will help to limit the amount of damage we deal with our forests and wildlife. Many of us support what’s best for humans in our lifetime and don’t look into the bigger picture. People fail to think about how their actions affect plants and animals in their ecosystem and future generations as well.
To know more about We Grow Forest Foundation please visit our website https://wegrowforest.org/ or contact us at on 9778411911 or email at us plant@wegrowforest.org
