How can we save the rainforest?

How can we save the rainforest?

1. Rainforests are disappearing from the face of the globe.

2. Limited resources

   • Countries with significant rainforest cover are generally not very rich, as such, rural people's day-to-day survival is dependent upon natural-resource use. They must live off the land that surrounds them, making use of whatever resources they can find.
     • To conserve wildlands in these countries, it will require reconciling the inevitable conflicts between short-term needs of local people and the long-term nature of the benefits that conservation can generate on a sustainable, ongoing basis.

3. There are 5 basic steps to saving rainforests. ''TREES'' is an acronym for:

   • • -Teach- others about the importance of the environment and how they can help save rainforests.
   • •-Restore- damaged ecosystems by planting trees on land where forests have been cut down.
   • •-Encourage- people to live in a way that doesn't hurt the environment.
   • •-Establish- parks to protect rainforests and wildlife
   • •-Support- companies that operate in ways that minimize damage to the environment.

4. Forces behind rainforest loss

   • Rainforests are being cut mostly for economic reasons, though there are other reasons as well. A significant portion of deforestation is caused by poor farmers trying to eke out a living on marginal lands. Beyond conversion for subsistence agriculture, activities like logging, clearing for commercial agriculture are sizable contributors to deforestation on a global scale. Agricultural fires typically used for land-clearing often spread outside cultivated areas and into degraded rainforest regions.

5. Addressing deforestation

   • requires taking the very different needs and interests of some groups into account.
     • Poor farmers: A better approach to addressing the needs of the rural poor may be improving and intensifying currently existing agricultural projects and promoting alternative cultivation techniques. A benefit of such techniques is that they maintain forest systems, soils, and biological diversity at a far higher level than do conventional agricultural approaches. As long as such fields are adjacent to secondary and old-growth forest, many species will continue to thrive.
       • Based on an area of research, ancient societies that lived in the Amazon rainforest before the arrival of Europeans in the 15th century were able to enrich the rainforest soil to improve the soil quality. By improving soil quality, large areas of the Amazon that have been deforested could be used to support agriculture. This could help reduce pressure on rainforest areas for agricultural land.
     • Industrial/commercial developers: The use of natural pest control and fertilizers can help reduce pollution caused by agricultural operations, while leaving strips of forest as corridors linking sections of forest helps moderate biodiversity losses.

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