Forest conversion: Impact of agriculture and plantations

It's all in your breakfast: coffee beans and tea are often grown on land that was originally covered by natural forests. Photo credits: coffee and toast © Redcipolla |  Aerial shot of the Amazon showing forest fire © WWF-Canon / Mark EDWARDS | Jaguar, Brazil © WWF-Canon / Michel GUNTHER

It's morning. We hurry with our shower, some of us take extra time applying make-up, while others indulge in a breakfast of cereal, toast and coffee.

A normal start to a normal day, you say. So why is it that by the time we walk out of our house, we have unknowingly contributed to deforestation in Brazil, the extinction of orangutans in Sumatra and soil erosion in Paraguay? What is the link with forest conversion?

What is forest conversion?

Conversion is an increasingly destructive practice whereby natural forests are chopped down to meet other land needs.

Where forest ecosystems once thrived, plantations (e.g. pulp wood, oil palm and coffee among others), agriculture, pasture for cattle (e.g. around the Amazon region), settlements and mining take over - usually irreversibly. Here we look at the problems caused by plantations and agriculture.

Key fact
According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), 7.3 million ha of natural forest are lost annually (20,000 ha per day), equivalent to an area twice the size of Paris.¹ 

What's happening?

We all know that plantations and agriculture farming, including livestock production, sustain humankind.

But conversion of forests – from South America's tropical forests to Russia’s temperate forests – to meet worldwide demand for palm oil, paper, coffee and other goods is leading to deforestation and a range of ecological and social impacts.

As a result, agriculture is widely believed to be one of the main causes of deforestation. Around the world, as you read these words, forests are giving way to plantations for oil palm, soy, rubber, coffee, tea,  and rice among many other crops.

Of increasing concern is the soaring popularity of biofuels. Biofuels are generated from oils extracted from plants such as oil palm - which are often grown on land cleared of natural forests.
Find out more about more about biofuels and their impact

The link between forest conversion and you

The shampoo you use in the shower.

An ice-cream on the beach.

Two-hundred copies of your annual report.

All these things often come with more than a price tag: palm oil used in the shower gel and ice cream, and tree monocultures for paper pulp.

But boycotting these products is not the solution – after all, we couldn’t really do without them. What we can focus on instead is asking companies to ensure that forest conversion is not destroying High Conservation Value Forests, where endangered species such as the orangutan and elephant live.

What is causing forest conversion?

• Rising demand for soy, palm oil, cocoa and coffee is translating into expanding plantations for these crops worldwide. Versatile products like soy and palm oil are found in anything from animal feed to bread, and from lipstick to burgers - hence their popularity. This human 'footprint' on the Earth shows how our behavior in one part of the world can have negative impact on tropical forests and the people living in other part of world.
  
• Cheap land, labour, and government subsidies are creating more and more supply of agricultural goods, and to meet needs for increased production, plantations are constantly expanding.
  It is not clear how much producer countries benefit economically because increasing production often drives down commodity prices, creating cycles of ‘boom and bust’.²
  
• Poorly implemented environmental regulations are added incentives for some landowners and producers to convert forests for plantations inside protected areas, intimidate local people so that they are driven off their land, and set fires to clear land with little fear for interference by authorities.
  
• Global trade arrangements and trade barriers, such as the EU
  trade barriers for meat compared to 0% tariffs for soy beans.³

How is WWF dealing with the problems caused by conversion of natural forests to agriculture and plantations?