2011 – International Year of Forests

Feb. 2, 2011: The UN General Assembly declared 2011 as the International Year of Forests to raise awareness on the management, conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests, and to emphasize the connection between people and forests.

“By declaring 2011 as the International Year of Forests, the United Nations General Assembly has created an important platform to educate the global community about the great value of forests – and the extreme social, economic and environmental costs of losing them,” noted UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. “Every one of us, all seven billion people on earth, has our physical, economic and spiritual health tied to the health of our forest ecosystems.

Deforestation of tropical rainforests continues to be the highest threat to species. Estimates put the current losses of forest at over 10 million hectares per year, which is about the land area of a medium-sized country like Egypt, Bolivia, or Tanzania. As things now stand, few tropical forests will survive to the end of the 21st century.
The world’s forests are not only essential to life in all its diversity but also to achieving mankind’s biggest goals, such as reducing poverty, combating climate change, and attaining sustainable development.

About one half of the forests that covered the Earth are gone. Each year, another 16 million hectares disappear. The World Resources Institute estimates that only about 22% of the world’s (old growth) original forest cover remains “intact” – most of this is in three large areas: the Canadian and Alaskan boreal forest, the boreal forest of Russia, and the tropical forest of the northwestern Amazon Basin and the Guyana Shield

Closer to home, in Canada, deforestation is driven by demand for resources (agriculture, forest sector, etc), the need to build infrastructures (urban development, transportation corridors, recreation, hydroelectric development) and economic growth (natural resource extraction, etc).

We can all help by being conscientious of how we demand, use and dispose of products.

John Fisher, test your knowledge of forest!

Forest Quiz:

1. Forests cover 31% of total land area in the world               T     F
2. 2010 Percentage Forest Area in Canada:
   1. 50%
   2. 45%
   3. 34%
3. The livelihoods of over 1.6 billion people depend on forests.      T          F
4. In which country has 75% of the wet tropical rainforest been destroyed?
   1. Chile
   2. Congo
   3. Australia
5. Forests are home to 80% of our terrestrial biodiversity.             T          F
6. Canada has twice the forested and area as what European country?
   1. Finland
   2. Germany
   3. Norway
   4. Switzerland
7. 30% of forests are used for production of wood and non-wood products. T      F
8. “Boreal” comes from the Greek God, Boreas, meaning God of the __________ wind.
   1. South
   2. arctic
   3. cold
   4. North
9. Which country has the most forested land area?
   1. Canada
   2. United States
   3. Brazil
   4. Russia
10. The boreal forest is THE single most important breeding ground for birds in Canada. It is estimated that 300 species and 5 BILLION individual birds breed in the boreal forest before migrating south. As Ontario is at the heart of the nation’s boreal forest, it is Ontario’s songbird nursery and essential east-west-south connector across the continent. What percentage of the boreal region is within a kilometer of a road?
    1. 0%
    2. 15%
    3. 30%

For answers, read next week’s Squawk!

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