Global forest loss surged to record highs in 2024, driven by a catastrophic rise in fires, according to new data from the University of Maryland's Global Land Analysis & Discovery (GLAD [6]) Lab, made available May 20 on the World Resources Institute [7]'s Global Forest Watch [8] platform. Loss of tropical primary forests alone reached 6.7 million hectares—nearly twice as much as in 2023 and an area nearly the size of Panama, at a rate of 18 soccer fields each minute. For the first time on record, fires—not agriculture—were the leading cause of tropical primary forest loss, accounting for nearly 50% of all destruction. This marks a dramatic shift from recent years, when fires averaged just 20%. Yet, tropical primary forest loss driven by other causes also jumped by 14%, the sharpest increase since 2016. (WRI [10])
Meanwhile, there is growing cause for skepticism about some officially embraced measures to curtail forest destruction. The Republic of Congo has been supposedly protecting about half of its dense rainforests via the UN-backed Reducing Emissions from Deforestation & forest Degradation (REDD+ [11]) framework since 2020, in exchange for payments from the World Bank. But an investigation by rainforest monitor Mongabay reveals [12] the Brazzaville government has granted [13] nearly 80 gold mining and exploration permits in areas covered by the project, driving deforestation and negatively impacting local populations. (Mongabay [14])
