Illegal Logging and Biodiversity Degradation in the Tropics

Logging is a wood harvesting practice of extracting commercial with mostly merchantable timber from a forest. What does this mean? What and why is tropical forest degradation?

Tropical forest is diverse in terms of flora (plant species) and fauna (wildlife species); it provides various goods such as timber for construction, and non-timber products such as tree resin, medicines, bee honey, mushroom, food, meat, firewood etc. for daily livelihood of the local population. Forest also provides various services such as protection of local cultures and belief, clean water, watershed protection, fresh air and climate regulation. Unfortunately, tropical forest is located in a continent experiencing rapid economic development and fast growing population along with political uncertainties, and where most of the poor live.

Tropical forest has been cleared for population resettlements or displacements, agricultural cultivation, and sometimes due to the indiscriminate logging practices that open uncontrolled accessible road to the anarchic landless farmers who continue to settle and clear the forests for housing and agricultural cultivation. The rate of deforestation of the tropical natural forest is about 0.7% or 14.4 million ha annually between 1980 and 2003. Tropical deforestation is responsible for the release of about 20-29% of the global carbon emissions. It has been estimated that total area of tropical rain forest declines from 14% of the earth