2023-10-23 20:00:14
It will not be possible to completely stop deforestation by 2030, the World Wildlife Fund warns in its annual update. A new way to predict deforestation using AI may help.
Perverse incentives are holding back the transition to a sustainable, climate-proof world. This applies not only to ‘fossil subsidies’, but also to the pumping of groundwater, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) warned last week. On Tuesday, the WWF added a new warning: stopping global deforestation will not be possible as long as felling is made financially attractive.
More than a hundred countries agreed two years ago at the climate summit in Glasgow to stop deforestation by 2030: felling is only allowed if the forest is simultaneously replenished with new trees. It is still possible, according to WWF’s latest Forest Pathways report, but government leaders and companies must keep their promises.
Summit over the three main rainforest areas
The report calculates that at least a hundred times as much government money goes to subsidies that harm forests as the $2.2 billion that governments put directly into forest conservation. By 2022, 6.6 million hectares of forest will have disappeared, of which 4.1 million hectares will be primary tropical forest, which is roughly the size of the Netherlands.
Tropical rainforest is valuable because it has a high biodiversity and a lot of CO2 holds. However, under pressure from a warming, drier and more extreme climate, rainforests are in danger of releasing carbon instead of capturing it, WWF warns. Further deforestation in the Amazon, the Congo Basin and Southeast Asia might lead to a climate catastrophe on Earth.
The three most important rainforest areas will be the focus of their own summit at the end of this week, the Three Basin Summit in the Republic of Congo, where they want to form a global coalition to protect forests. Just as at the Amazon summit at the beginning of August – which did not lead to a firm agreement on stopping deforestation – the leaders of the rainforest countries will appeal to the rest of the world for financial support. They cannot alone bear the costs of maintaining the forests that are so important for the climate.
The sound of the local residents comes through more loudly
Asia is well on its way to zero gross deforestation, WWF says. This is partly due to good legislation and regulations, says Hans Beukeboom, program manager Borneo, Sumatra, Papua at WWF Netherlands. “Palm oil and forest products are certified in Indonesia and Malaysia and sustainability is a top priority due to trade with the West. There is a big influence from NGOs, like us. This is decreasing, but on the other hand the noise from the local residents is becoming more prevalent.”
The economic basis in Asia is also better than in Africa, Beukeboom explains. “Congo, for example, still mainly looks at the economic profit that can be achieved from the rainforest. Moreover, we do not know which direction the military coups in various African countries are going. But there are positive examples: Gabon has good environmental legislation and enforcement and Cameroon is also making good progress.”
The Amazon, the largest rainforest in the world, has not yet recovered from the blows inflicted under the previous Brazilian president Bolsonaro. “He just wanted to make money quickly. Fortunately, his successor Lula has a different sound. But in the meantime we are already seeing the consequences of climate change, such as the river dolphins that are currently stranding and dying en masse due to drought and warming in the Amazon.”
Preventing illegal deforestation with the help of AI
Predicting where illegal logging will occur is the latest way to combat deforestation. The Forest Foresight system, which WWF Netherlands is developing together with Wageningen University & Research, can predict deforestation up to six months in advance. And the system is constantly improving itself.
Forest Foresight works with artificial intelligence (AI), the system links satellite images from the Radar for Detecting Deforestation of Wageningen University to information from other datasets such as road networks. “For example, by linking images of the construction of a road to a forest with knowledge regarding previous deforestation, the system sees patterns,” says Jorn Dallinga, Forest Foresight program manager at WWF Netherlands. “We now use 35 indicators to predict deforestation. Wageningen principal researcher Johannes Reiche looks at the effectiveness and optimizes the technology.”
The system has been running for four years in Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo. It has also been successfully tested in Gabon and forest rangers have been trained to work with it. Only in Suriname, the third test area, is the government not yet cooperating. The intention is to use the system in at least twelve countries over the next three years.
“Half of all deforestation in the tropical ring is illegal,” Dallinga explains. “This system can contribute to combating this, through more targeted patrols, arrests and conversations with local communities that use the forest. This way, logging can be prevented instead of determining followingwards what has been lost. Each country must do this in its own way, because here it concerns soy and there it concerns palm oil, the patterns are different everywhere.”
Because the AI system has a learning capacity, it can accelerate the approach to deforestation, expects Hans Beukeboom of WWF. “International agreements require years of change, just like new legislation. The European deforestation law requires companies to demonstrate that the products they import are deforestation-free, but that will not solve the problem as long as major buyers such as China and India do not have such a law. Forest Foresight will also not have enormous effects immediately, but once we start achieving results it will skyrocket. I am hopeful that we can make great strides towards 2030.”
Also read:
There is no end to deforestation yet, but the Amazon summit has not completely failed
The desired end to deforestation is not yet in sight following the Amazon summit in Belém. Nevertheless, steps have been taken, especially towards cooperation between the Amazon countries.
No European country imports more soy, palm oil and cocoa products than the Netherlands
The Netherlands is the largest importer in Europe of goods at risk of deforestation, such as soy, palm oil and cocoa. This is reported by CBS. Most of it ends up in other countries.
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