Tropical Rainforests perform an irreplaceable function by motivating the climate across the globe.The temperature, evaporated water, liquid water, and intense circulation of the moisture of the planet drives the climate like no other element. The loss of the equatorial rain forests will be a devastating event this planet will not survive.
Tropical rainforests
On planet Earth, there are forest near the central area of the planet called the equator that currently cover seven percent of the earth's dry land surface.
Climate impact
These forests help to control the Earths’ climate by processing and moving the fresh water of the planet.
The Amazon River basin contains twenty percent of the world's fresh water. It rains heavily between six and nine months of the year in these locations. This cools the land, moves water, and causes air currents to race across the surface of the Earth carrying moisture with them. The amazons’ Photosynthesis also processes carbon dioxide releasing oxygen and water vapor which provides more than twenty percent of the air we breathe and accounts for much of the moisture in the rainforests.
The amazon rainforest has been described as the "Lungs of our Planet" because it provides the essential environmental world service of continuously recycling carbon dioxide into oxygen. More than 20 percent of the world oxygen is produced in the amazon rainforest.
Life found in the rainforests
In addition to the services it provides the rest of the world, rainforests hold more than fifty percent of all life known on Earth. Fifty percent of the known plants in the world exist in Colombia alone. Myself and other researchers are discovering more plant species and animal species every day also.
A colleague of mine, Thomas Croat, has discovered, documented, and published over one hundred thousand species in just one family of plants located in the tropical equator region of the world. He has suggested an equal amount or more still waits to be discovered.
Tropical rainforest loss
Problems abound with the regions where these forests exist.
Most are in third world countries where very little importance is placed on the altruistic but very real value of these tropical regions. They only value the money they can take from the timber, cattle, and African palm oil. Each year I watch more and more of our beautiful Colombia lost to the greed of corrupt people who do not even care about Colombia. These people only care about the five hundred thousand pesos they can make monthly per hectare. Sadly, there are native crops that grown sustainable would provide more income for them with a more sustainable outlook. An even better benefit is these crops can be grown in shady areas allowing for cultivation within virgin forests.
Trees absorb CO2, removing and storing carbon while releasing oxygen into the air, they are very valuable, natural carbon sinks.
Desertification
As the race across the surface of the equatorial forests razes the land, deserts follow. African palms take up all the moisture in the surrounding area and give nothing back. The oil they produce is a cheap and unhealthy oil that most would not choose if only they knew. They also do not allow for the diversity of the forest cut down to be replaced by them. It is a foreign mono-culture that does not lend itself to bettering the ecosystem where it is planted. Cattle farming leaves wide open pastures where once stood majestic trees.
Endemic loss
Old growth trees often hold ecosystems completely endemic to their own canopy. What this means is you may find an orchid here or a frog that literally exist nowhere else in the world, not even in the next tree over.
Cutting down this tree for a table top, to make way for an african palm plantation, or firewood seems a trivial re-purposing when thinking the vastness of the loss incurred to the diversity of life on this planet.
Salvation
There are ways to help with this monster of a problem. Donate to charities that champion the cause of saving the rainforests, donate to land purchasing endeavors that aim to preserve the land, speak out against the unfettered destruction of this worlds’ lungs simply to make money, check ingredients and do not buy products with African palm oil or derivatives, avoid soy, and stop eating beef. All these things will help though very little. You decide to vote for a party or president because everyone else does.
You decide who you are supporting with your money and with your trust. You might not always have the option to vote with your dollars, but it is up to you!
Education
The locals who steward these regions of our world are for the most part unaware of the value they represent to the whole world. They are also unaware of the many benefits the forests can provide with sustainable cultivation methods allowing for a steady income to these many peoples. We must strive to educate them. Most are under the impression that Colombia and the rest of the tropical regions are alone and belong to them. They must realize they are a part of the world that will destroy life as we know it if not managed well for posterity.
