Year: 2022
Type: editorial
Abstract: It is widely recognized that forests play a vital role in sustaining life on Earth and human well-being through the provision of essential services (e.g., clean air, carbon reduction and habitats for animals and plants) and by being a source of livelihood and income for about 25% of the world's population (including vulnerable and indigenous communities).1 And yet, there is ample evidence that the world's forests are under serious threat.According to the latest joint report by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), global deforestation and forest degradation continued to take place at 'alarming rates' in 2015-2020, and some 420 million hectares of forest have been lost through conversion to other land uses over the past three decades.2 Illegal logging and agricultural expansion have been the chief drivers of this dangerous trend, partly due to international demand for, and trade in, timber products and agricultural commodities.3 Deforestation and forest degradation are, in turn, primary contributors to global warming and biodiversity lossthe two most pressing environmental challenges of our time.4 It is equally no secret that the European Union (EU) bears significant responsibility for this destruction of forests around the globe, being ranked as the world's second-largest importer (after China) of commodities linked to deforestation in 2018.5 However, the EU appears now to be determined to reverse its consumption-driven contribution to global deforestation and forest degradation.Just a few days after the UN climate summit in Glasgow in November 2021, the European
Source: European Foreign Affairs Review
DOI: 10.54648/eerr2022036
Author: Gracia Marín Durán
Institution: University College London
Language: English
Subfield: Global and Planetary Change
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDGs: Life on land, Climate action
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4318817075