Deforestation

Teachers’ Notes
Key Stage 2
Key Terms
Biomass, Carbon Storage, Charcoal, Climate, Deforestation, Ecology, Erosion, Extinction,
Global Warming, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Nutrients, Plantations, Rainforest, Soil,
Subsistence Agriculture, Tropics, Water Cycle

Learning Outcomes
Through using this resource pupils will be given
opportunities to:
•Discover the characteristics of rainforests and learn what
benefits they provide
•Understand why forests are sometimes cut down and the impacts of this
•Develop a greater understanding of the impact of deforestation globally, in Madagascar
and in Northern Ireland
Deforestation - What is Happening?
•1.5 acres of forest are cut down every second, 36
football pitches every minute: 18 million acres (7.3
million ha) are lost every year
•Half of the world’s tropical forests have already been
lost
•A 2012 study by UNEP and Interpol states that illegal
logging accounts for up to 30% of the global logging trade
and contributes to over 50% of tropical deforestation in Central Africa, the Amazon
Basin and South East Asia
• Illegal trade of forest resources undermines international security, and is frequently
associated with corruption, money laundering, organized crime, human rights abuses and
sometimes violent conflict
•Deforestation leads to soil erosion, flooding, wildlife extinctions, increases in greenhouse
gas emissions and loss of carbon storage
Terms in bold are defined in
•Main causes are human activities (chiefly logging and
the Glossary
clearing for agriculture) and direct climate change impacts
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Some global facts – Rainforests and Deforestation
•Tropical rainforests cover only 6-7% of the Earth’s surface but contain over half of all the
plant and animal species in the world!
•1 in 4 people depend directly on forests for their livelihoods
•Deforestation accounts for 6-17% of greenhouse gas emissions
•Forests cover 30% of the Earth’s land
•At current rates of loss all rainforests could be lost in just 100 years
•Agriculture is the main cause of deforestation
•On a global scale there was twice as much tropical forest
at the start of the 20th century as there is today, with
only around 700 million of the original 1.5 billion hectares
remaining.
•Globally deforestation and desertification (caused by
human activities and climate change) are causing major
human impacts and greatly decreasing land’s productivity

Some global facts – Causes

•Create land for agricultural use - food production, luxury crops, rangeland, crops for
animal feeds
•Clearance for living space – houses to cities
•Timber harvesting – luxury timber, building materials and fuel wood
•Mining – ‘strip’ mining for gems, metals, fossil fuels
•Wildfires – increasingly important as a result of climate change
•Climate change – sea level rise, droughts, floods, fires
•Conflicts and wars – destruction of forests and cropland

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Some global facts –Effects
•Loss of biodiversity – 70% of species live in forests
•Climate change – Deforestation accounts for 6-17% of GHG
•Impacts on global warming – solar reflection, rainfall and air
currents
•Soil erosion – tree roots hold soil, cutting leads to erosion
and loss of soil biodiversity and fertility
•Water cycle – disruption of water cycle and rainfall patterns, erosion leads to flooding,
silting and poor water quality
Rainforest Benefits
•High biodiversity – provide homes to over half of all
plants and animals on the planet – up to 300 species of
trees per acre
•‘Lungs of the planet’ – produce oxygen, absorb carbon
dioxide and purify the air
•Climate stabilisation – storing carbon and modifying
climate impacts
•Storing water and maintaining the water cycle, protecting
against floods, droughts and erosion
•Maintain a healthy soil, minimising erosion by protecting
it from heavy rains and anchoring the soil and recycling
nutrients from leaf fall

Effects of Forest Fragmentation

•When areas are deforested the animals and many plants living there are killed or forced
to move leading to reduced biodiversity
•Reducing the size of habitat patches leads to changes in the patches remaining, in terms
of species composition, hydrology, and soil characteristics
•Population sizes are reduced, leading to increased likelihood of local extinctions,
especially if subjected to other challenges such as climate change impacts
•Edge effects increase and alter the conditions in the remaining habitat
•Many plants and animals in rainforests:
•Have irregular distributions within the forest,
•Require a range of habitat types or species
for feeding, nesting or protection
•Require a large home range in which to carry
out feeding – especially large predators
•Cannot live close to others of their species

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The Indri
•Largest living lemur – an extinct lemur species was the size of a gorilla
•Adults weigh 6 – 9.5 kg, and they are the only lemur without a tail
•Lives in family groups – pair and their infant; pair for life with one infant born every 2 – 3
years from the age of about 8
•Strict vegetarians, they require over 40 types of forest plants
•Can leap up to 10 m between tree trunks
•Call every morning to other groups in the area, a haunting howling sound that can carry
for 4 km. The pair synchronise their
calling, and sing duets for up to 3
minutes at a time
•Lives only in eastern rainforests in
Madagascar
•Cannot survive in captivity
•Severely endangered as its habitat is
being lost

Baobab trees
•1 Genus - 8 species globally, 6 endemic to Madagascar, one in Australia, one in Africa–
distribution demonstrates continental drift
•Live in forests – when found isolated, as in Avenue of the Baobabs, the forest has been
removed
•Trees can store thousands of litres of water (up to 120,000 l), making them well adapted
to draught conditions
•Wood is fibrous and of no use for firewood or building, bark can be used for roofing,
clothing and rope, harvested relatively sustainably (though tree is damaged)
•Provide food and homes for many species of animals and plants
•Some subspecies are critically endangered as there is no natural regeneration –
pollinators or seed dispersers no
longer exist
•Trees are long-lived, hundreds
of years at least. Radiocarbon
dating has aged an African
baobab at 1275 years, but some
may be much older
•They are the oldest known
flowering tree

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What Rainforests do for People
•Providing: food, medicines, firewood,
shelter, incomes
•Regulating: water quality and quantity,
climate, air quality, soil health
•Modifying: weather, impacts of climate
change, flooding
•Cultural Services: local cultures and
history, recreation, tourism,
aesthetics
•Supporting: biodiversity, soil formation, nutrient cycling, water cycling, oxygen
production and CO2 absorption

Some Deforestation Facts - Madagascar

•Almost all soil is either highly or very highly damaged
•In the last 80 years 75% of forested land has been converted to crops, rangeland or towns
and villages
•Need for cropland and firewood has pushed ‘slash and burn’ further up slopes and left
almost no natural forest outside of reserves
•In May 2015, 420 tonnes of rosewood, worth
an estimated $13m, was seized on just one
operation
•Illegal logging continues with no effective
checks – almost no trees large enough to
reproduce remain outside reserves
•Soil erosion results from deforestation and
causes infrastructure damage, flooding and
degradation of waterways
How is deforested land used in Madagascar?
•Urbanisation and villages
•Agriculture
•Commercial – rice and export crops,
sisal
•Subsistence – rice and vegetables
•Cattle and rangeland
•Energy – charcoal, especially Eucalyptus and
Pine which are also used for building
•Infrastructure - roads, electricity
•Resources – mining (legal and illegal)
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Slash and Burn
•A way to clear forested land for farming
•Valuable timber is removed in
advance and either sold or used for
charcoal
•Carried out throughout the tropics,
where soils are thin, low in nutrients,
and vulnerable to erosion
•Nutrients from burning are available
for one or two years of crops, but after
that the soil is unproductive and
people clear more land for crops
•Particularly damaging on slopes where erosion leads to rapid soil loss

Eucalyptus Woodland
Benefits
•Timber for building
•Firewood and charcoal
•Jobs and incomes
•Limited soil stabilisation (when compared
to bare soil)
•Some shelter for other plants and animals
Problems
•Soil erosion from clearing land
•Poor soil health – low soil microbial diversity
•Eucalyptus are very ‘thirsty’ and highly efficient at extracting soil water, decreasing that
available for other plants or downstream human use
•Alien species, provides almost no food for native animals

Big Issues – Impacted by and impacts on:

•Climate Change •Biodiversity
•Energy •Waste and Pollution
•Water •Health
•Soil •Food
•Air
How does deforestation impact on each of these?
How does each of these affect land that has been
deforested?
In Madagascar? In Northern Ireland? On a global scale?
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Connections
•Land use impacts on water quality
•Climate change exaggerates the
impacts of poor soil management and
damages infrastructure, and leads to
droughts and famine
•Slash and Burn is having serious
impacts on the biodiversity and ability
of the land to support varied wildlife
•Use of charcoal as the main energy source drives expansion of plantings of exotic trees
and further clearing of forests
•Human health suffers from poor water quality, reduced ability to travel to healthcare and
a limited diet

Big Actions for Madagascar

•Raise awareness of the impacts of deforestation on people’s lives
•Help local people understand the problems caused by deforesting uplands
•Develop local, multiple use reserves that show the benefits of rainforests
•Provide alternatives so people stop deforestation
•Encourage renewable energy solutions for cooking to replace wood and charcoal
•Manage land to reduce negative impacts – promoting sustainable agricultural practices,
halting erosion, improving water retention
•Promote jobs and incomes that rely on intact rainforest, such as tourism
•Reinstate forests
•Provide incentives for replanting forests and woodlands

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Reforestation Around the World
•The UN has set a target to restore 350m hectares by 2030 – an area bigger than India.
•China is using soldiers to plant forests the size of Ireland to combat air pollution and
global warming
•A province in Pakistan has planted 1 billion trees in two years, in response to floods in
2015.
•In July 2017, 1.5 million people in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh planted more than
67 million trees in a 12 hour period
•11 countries plan to build a wall of trees from east to west across Africa in order to push
back the desert
•Cameroon is committed to restoring over 12 million hectares of forest in the Congo Basin
•Brazil started a project to
plant 73 million trees, the
largest tropical reforestation
project in history
•200m trees in Niger have
been planted or encouraged to
naturally regenerate on 5m
hectares; food production has
increased by 600,000 tonnes a
year in the places where the
trees have returned

Local Links - Forests in Northern Ireland

•Until the 17th century much of Northern Ireland was woodland
•Northern Ireland is one of the least wooded areas in the EU, with only 10% of land as
woodland, including scrub
•40% of this tree cover is coniferous woodland planted for timber
•There is less than 0.04% Ancient
Woodland remaining
•Targets for reforestation have been
set but are repeatedly missed
•Agroforestry has many potential
benefits which are just being
recognised

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 Activities KS2
PDMU, ICT & Science and Technology
•Divide the class into groups to research and prepare presentations for the class on:
•Causes of deforestation
•Effects of deforestation
•Importance of rainforests
•Extent and impact of illegal logging
•Have each pupil select an animal living in the Madagascar rainforest. Prepare a poster
with a picture and information about that animal and how it depends on the forest for its
existence
•What is wood used for? Survey the school for the many uses of wood. Are there
alternatives?
•Visit a local forest. Note the wildlife you see, including the different types of trees. If
possible compare the wildlife in a forest with many types of trees to a plantation of one
type
•Plant a tree/trees in your school or community to highlight the benefits of trees

Language and Literacy

•As a class, list words that describe the pupils’ feelings about Forests and then about
Deforestation. (Imagery should be used).
•The Big Debate: Is one person building a house out of wood worth the damage to the
forest? Is it ethical?
•Write a poem or story about deforestation

Art
•Wood You Believe It? Find 10 things in the school that come from trees
•Discuss and compare two paintings (Google Famous Rainforest Paintings) showing
rainforests. Is the art more effective than a photograph? Why?

Drama
Go to a local forest. Or, use props from a forest. Game: “Whatever is that?” Give the
children 30 seconds to find an object from a set area and come back to the circle. Each
child should tell an unusual and imaginary story about their object to the person sitting
next to them.
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Numeracy
•Create digital posters that encourage responsible wood and paper usage, linking to tropi-
cal deforestation
•If 1.5 acres of forest is cut down every second, how much is lost every Minute, Hour, Day,
Week, Month, Year
•Visit a forest. Ask children to discuss what shapes they can see. Discuss symmetry, size,
shadows, patterns
•Calculate the size of a tree (without cutting it down!)

Drama
Go to a local forest. Or, use props from a forest. Game: “Whatever is that?” Give the chil-
dren 30 seconds to find an object from a set area and come back to the circle. Each child
should tell an unusual and imaginary story about their object to the person sitting next to
them.

Music
Split the class into two groups 1. The Forest 2. The Machines to cut down the trees. Ask
group 1 to think of the various noises you may hear in a rainforest in Madagascar. Can they
use their instruments to recreate these sounds? Group 2 should think of the noises the
machinery/work people responsible for the cutting down of the trees might make. (Provide
both groups with visual stimuli). Bring both groups together for a performance that repre-
sents machinery moving in to cut down a forest

Some Useful Websites

•World Economic Forum - https://www.weforum.org/
•World Resources Institute - http://www.wri.org/
•Conservation International - https://www.conservation.org/
•Centre for Biological Diversity - www.BiologicalDiversity.org
•WWF-UK - https://www.wwf.org.uk/
•https://www.livescience.com/27692-deforestation.html
•https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/deforestation/
•http://www.rainforestfoundationuk.org/

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 Glossary of Key Terms
Biomass – the total weight of organisms within a given area.
Carbon sink – the ability of natural environments and organisms to absorb and retain
carbon.
Charcoal – carbon obtained from burning wood, bone or other substances in the absence
of air. Used for cooking on open fires.
Climate – weather conditions in a wide area over a long period.
Deforestation – removal of trees and woodlands, often leading to complete destruction of
the woodland habitat.
Ecology – interaction of living things with each other and their physical environment.
Erosion – process by which stone and soils are weathered away by action of water, wind or
other natural factors.
Extinction – when all members of a species have died.
Global Warming – the gradual increase in the overall temperature of the earth’s
atmosphere caused by greenhouse gases and other pollutants.
Greenhouse Gas Emissions – a group of gasses which contribute to global warming by
absorbing infrared radiation.
Infrastructure – basic physical and organisational structures and facilities needed for
society to function (roads, buildings, power, water).
Mining – removal of valuable materials contained within the soil.
Nutrients – substances providing nourishment essential for life and growth.
Plantation – an area of trees or plants grown as a crop for commercial purposes; generally
consisting of only one species.
Rainforest – forests growing where rainfall is high. Can be tropical or temperate.
Sisal – a Mexican agave plant with large leaves cultivated for fibre used in ropes or matting.
Soil – surface of the earth generally containing a mixture of inorganic minerals and
particles and organic remains.
Subsistence Agriculture – self-sufficient farming where people grow food to feed
themselves and their families, sometimes with modest amount of local trade.
Tropics – region north and south of the equator reaching between the Tropics of Cancer in
the North and Capricorn in the South.
Water Cycle – cycle of processes by which water circulates between oceans, atmosphere
and land, including precipitation, drainage, evaporation and transpiration.
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