24% Of Papua's Rainforests Destroyed Or Degraded In Past 30 Years - Mongabay

Nearly one quarter of Papua New Guinea's rainforests were damaged or destroyed between 1972 and 2002, report researchers writing in the journal Biotopica.

The results, which were published in a report last June, show that Papua New Guinea is losing forests at a much faster rate than previously believed. Over the 30-year study period 15 percent of Papua New Guinea's tropical forests were cleared and 8.8 percent were degraded through logging. "Our analysis does not support the theory that PNG’s forests have escaped the rapid changes recorded in other tropical regions," write the authors. "We conclude that rapid and substantial forest change has occurred in Papua New Guinea."

Deforestation and forest degradation in Papua New Guinea are primarily driven by logging, followed by clearing for subsistence agriculture. Since 2002 — a period not covered in the study — reports suggest that conversion of forest for industrial agriculture, especially oil palm plantations, has increased.

The study is based on comparisons between a land-cover map from 1972 and a land-cover map created from nationwide high-resolution satellite imagery recorded since 2002. The authors found that most deforestation occurred in commercially accessible forest, where forest loss range from 1.1 and 3.4 percent per year. Overall deforestation was 0.8 to 1.8 percent per year, higher than reported by the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), but lower than neighboring islands including Borneo and Sumatra. Overall Papua New Guinea's primary forest cover fell from 33.23 million hectares to 25.33 million hectares during the period. 2.92 million hectares of forest were degraded by logging.

EDIT

http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0222-png.html

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