According to a research, the amount of forest per person on earth has declined by more than 60% over the past 60 years. This loss affects biodiversity and has an effect on 1.6 billion people’s lives globally.
The study, which was written up in the journal Environmental Research Letters, discovered that from 1960 to 2019, the world’s forest acreage decreased by 81.7 million hectares, with gross forest loss outpacing gross forest increase.
The global land use dataset was utilized by researchers from the Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute (FFPRI) in Japan to analyze changes in global forests through time and place.
They discovered that the combination of declining global forests and rising global population over the preceding 60 years has led to a reduction of the global forest area per capita of more than 60%, from 1.4 hectares in 1960 to 0.5 hectares in 2019.
The researchers concluded that “continuous loss and degradation of forests affect the integrity of forest ecosystems, reducing their capacity to generate and sustain essential services and biodiversity.”
They said that it has an effect on the lives of at least 1.6 billion people globally, primarily in poor nations, who depend on forests for a variety of reasons.