What! Deforestation slowed last year — but not enough to meet climate goals

Report finds that most nations are not on track to meet global pledge to protect Earth’s forests.

Countries are failing to meet international targets to stop global forest loss and degradation by 2030, according to a report. It is the first to measure progress since world leaders set the targets last year at the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow, UK. Preserving forests, which can store carbon and, in some cases, provide local cooling, is a crucial part of a larger strategy to curb global warming

NEWS

24 October 2022

Clarification 25 October 2022

Deforestation slowed last year — but not enough to meet climate goals

Report finds that most nations are not on track to meet global pledge to protect Earth’s forests.

Natasha Gilbert

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Aerial view of a deforested and burnt area of forest in Brazil

Deforested areas flank a highway running through the state of Amazonas in Brazil.Credit: Michael Dantas/AFP/Getty

Tropical forests have big climate benefits beyond carbon storage

The analysis, called the Forest Declaration Assessment, shows that the rate of global deforestation slowed by 6.3% in 2021, compared with the baseline average for 2018–20. But this “modest” progress falls short of the annual 10% cut needed to end deforestation by 2030, says Erin Matson, a consultant at Climate Focus, an advisory company headquartered in Amsterdam, and an author of the assessment, published on 24 October.

“It’s a good start, but we are not on track,” Matson said at a press briefing, although she cautioned that the assessment looks at only one year’s worth of data. A clearer picture of deforestation trends will emerge in successive years, she added.

The assessment, which was carried out by a number of civil-society and research groups, including the World Resources Institute, an environmental think tank in Washington DC, comes as nations gear up for the next big climate summit (COP27), due to be held in November in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. Scientists agree that to limit global warming to 1.5–2 °C above pre-industrial levels — a threshold beyond which Earth’s climate will become profoundly disrupted — deforestation must end.

Tropical forests are key

To track deforestation over the past year, the groups analysed indicators such as changes in forest canopy, as measured by satellite data, and the Forest Landscape Integrity Index, which is a measure of the ecological health of forests. The slow progress they found is attributable mainly to a few tropical countries where deforestation is highest (see ‘Progress report’). Among them is Brazil — the world’s largest contributor to tree loss — which saw a 3% rise in the rate of deforestation in 2021, compared with the baseline years. Rates also rose in heavy deforesters Bolivia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, by 6% and 3%, respectively, over the same period.

The loss of tropical forests, in particular, is worrisome because a growing body of research shows that besides sequestering carbon, these forests can physically cool nearby areas by creating clouds, humidifying the air and releasing certain cooling molecules. Keeping tropical forests standing provides a massive boost to global cooling that current policies ignore, says a report released alongside the Forest Declaration Assessment.

A region made up of tropical countries in Asia is the only one on track to halt deforestation by 2030, according to the assessment (see ‘Movement towards goal’). The region cut the rate at which it lost humid, old-growth forests last year by 20% from the 2018–20 baseline, mostly thanks to large strides made by Indonesia — normally one of the world’s largest contributors to deforestation — where the loss of old-growth forests fell by 25% in 2021 compared with the previous year.