What Does Deforestation Mean? (Slide 1)
Good morning/afternoon today I will be discussing the environmental change of deforestation in Australia. Deforestation is the permanent destruction of forests in order to make the land available for other uses such as; housing and urbanization, room to harvest timber to create commercial items such as paper, furniture and homes, room to create ingredients that are highly prized consumer items, such as the oil from palm trees and to create room for cattle ranching. What Issues Does Deforestation cause? (Slide 2)
Forests are complex ecosystems that affect practically every species on the planet. When they are tainted, it can set off an overwhelming chain of events both locally and around …show more content…
Every day, an estimated 100 plant and animal species are lost to deforestation. Loss of habitat can lead to species extinction. It also has negative consequences for medicinal research and local populations who rely on the animals and plants in the forests for hunting and medicine. Although they are uncertain of the figures, most scientists believe the rate of loss is grander now than at any time in the history of the Earth. Within the following 30 years as many as half of the species on the earth could die in one of the fastest mass extinctions in the planet's 4.5 billion years history. Massive extinctions have occurred five times during the earth's past, the last one was the extinction of the dinosaurs, 65 million years ago. Scientists are calling what is occurring now, the sixth mass extinction. Habitat loss poses the greatest threat to species. The world's forests, swamps, grasslands, lakes, and other habitats continue to vanish as they are harvested for human consumption and cleared to make way for agriculture, housing, roads, pipelines and the other trademarks of industrial development. Without a strong plan to generate terrestrial and marine endangered areas important ecological habitats will continue to be