Kourtney Suszko

Writing 1020
January 19, 2015

Deforestation
There are a few different reasons that cause people to cut down the rainforest , but are any
of them worth it why you look at the effects that it has on the world? There are few reasons that
people cut down the trees in the rainforest, but there are even more effects that it has on the
people around the world when they do end up cutting the trees down . Although cutting down
trees may benefit some people, it is unhealthy for the Earth as a whole because of all the damage
that is done in the process.
Rainforests in some parts of the world are threatened by the climate as well . There are
droughts that keep the trees from getting the correct amount of water that threatens them .
Droughts cause the trees to dry out and die . When the trees get dried out, they increase the
chance of a forest fire, and when there happens to be a forest fire, that eliminates even more
trees. When forests catch fire, it is sometimes because people set the fire on propose. People such
as ranchers, land developers or plantation owners may cause fires to clear the land for their own
use. Deforestation is the act of permanent destruction of a forest in order to make it available for
other uses. This occurs all around the world, but tropical rainforest are targeted the most
(Deforestation: Facts, Causes, and Effects). People are the main cause of rainforest destruction
though. The trees are cut down for the wood to make fires, and for the timber. They are also cut
down by people who want to use the land for agricultural purposes , they want to have either

large or small farms. In addition to making room for their farm , they have to cut down more to
make room for their animals to graze . Another reason the rainforest is being cut down is so that
they can use the trees for their pulp to make paper. Trees are also being cut down for the purpose
of extracting minerals from them (Why Are Rainforests Being Destroyed).
Rainforests are also cut down to make room for new houses and subdivisions for people
to live in. According to the World Wildlife Fund, a lot of the work in the rainforests is done
illegally. The two ways to get rid of the trees the fastest would be either cutting them down or
just burning them down. Burning them down is the quickest and easiest way, though it poses the
threat of the fire getting out of control (Deforestation: Facts, Cause, and Effects).
After people cut down the trees in the area , it is not even a good area for land . The people
who are cutting trees down to do their farming or crops are thinking that the soil will be decent ,
but research shows that the destruction of a forest will actually reduce the amount of rain that
falls in the surrounding area (Cutting Down Tropical Forests).
Forests are ecosystems that are very important to the carbon and water cycles that help to
sustain the life here on Earth. When forests are cut down it can set off a chain of events that can
reach all the way around the world. Also, about seventy percent of the Earths plants and animals
live in forests around the world, and when trees are cut down they lose their habitats, which can
lead to extinction of some of the species (Deforestation: Facts, Cases, and Effects). This affects
people in a negative way because many of the plants that are in forests are used in medicines or
for medical research. About eighty percent of the worlds documented species live in the
rainforest, meaning that deforestation puts most of the Earths biodiversity at risk of extinction

(Deforestation). Not only do we use the plants and animals that we know about, but we also lose
all of the ones that we have yet to discover, there could be cures for illnesses somewhere in the
forest, but we may never know about them because of deforestation. It also hurts the local people
around the forest because they need the plants and animals for hunting proposes (Effects of
Deforestation).
Forests also help absorb greenhouse gases that are harmful to humans, they take in the
carbon that comes from people, and that contributes to the global climate. The trees provide
shelter for the creatures that live there, and it also helps to regulate the temperatures. Removing
trees could cause a drastic temperature change going from day to night, like it does in the desert,
which could cause harm to the animals and plants there (Effects of Deforestation). Without trees
more greenhouse gasses enter the atmosphere. When trees are either cut down, burned, or
removed in another way, they start to emit carbon into the air. According to the World Wildlife
Fund, forests hold more than 210 gigatons of carbon, and deforestation makes up about fifteen
percent of greenhouse gasses (Deforestation: Facts, Causes, and Effects).
Trees are also a huge part of the water cycle. They take water that is in the ground into
their roots and then release it back into the atmosphere. More than half of the water in the
ecosystem is held in the plants that are within the forests, and without the plants and trees, the
climate will become dryer. Without trees the sun will have more access to the soil which will
cause it to dry out quicker, which means that the people who are cutting down trees for farming
proposes wont have much luck with growing their crops anyways. Crops that are planted in the
soil that was once where a forest was, wont grow as well as if they were planted somewhere else
because their roots are not as strong as tree roots and they will make the soil even worse. Cutting

down trees will cause soil erosion. With soil erosion a good amount of soil will end up going into
lakes, and other sources of water, which will decrease the local water quality, which could cause
sickness within the community. Soil erosion will also cause flooding to occur because the soil
that leaves the areas around the water will no longer be keeping the water in its designated area
(Deforestation: Facts, Causes, and Effects).
The rainforests are cut down for many reasons. It makes more room for such things like
farming, logging, or building houses, but those causes for cutting them down arent worth it
considering the effects that deforestation has on the globe. When the trees are cut down it gets rid
of habitats for the animals that live there. When the animals that live there go extinct, we will no
longer have their resources that they provide. The plants that live in the forests provide many
medicines for us to use, and there are even more plants that have yet to be discovered, and those
plants that arent discovered yet many have the cures for illnesses that we have not been able to
cure yet, which is why we should be more careful when it comes to deforestation.

Works Cited

"Why Are Rainforests Being Destroyed." Why Are Rainforests Being Destroyed. N.p., 24 June
2004. Web.
17 Jan. 2015. <http://kids.mongabay.com/elementary/501.html>.
"Deforestation: Facts, Causes, and Effects." Live Science. N.p., 6 Mar. 2013. Web. 17 Jan. 2015.
<http://www.livescience.com/27692-deforestation.html>.
Pachamama Alliance. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2015. <http://www.pachamama.org/
effects-of-deforestation>.
"Deforestation." World Wildlife Fund. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2015. <http://wwf.panda.org/
about_our_earth/about_forests/deforestation/>.