Agricultural expansion vs forests, biodiversity and ecosystem functions

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From a recent study by Laurence et al.:

The human population is projected to reach 11 billion this century, with the greatest increases in tropical developing nations. This growth, in concert with rising per-capita consumption, will require large increases in food and biofuel production. How will these megatrends affect tropical terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and biodiversity? The authors of this study foresee (i) major expansion and intensification of tropical agriculture, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa and South America; (ii) continuing rapid loss and alteration of tropical old-growth forests, woodlands, and semi-arid environments; (iii) a pivotal role for new roadways in determining the spatial extent of agriculture; and (iv) intensified conflicts between food production and nature conservation. The state that key priorities are to improve technologies and policies that promote more ecologically efficient food production while optimizing the allocation of lands to conservation and agriculture.

More comprehensive information can be found here:

http://news.mongabay.com/2014/0116-population-growth-food-deforestation.html

and the paper:

William F. Laurance, Jeffrey Sayer, and Kenneth Cassman (2013). Agricultural expansion and its impacts on tropical nature. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 2013 Dec 30. pii: S0169-5347(13)00292-9. doi: 10.1016/j.tree.2013.12.001.

2 Answers

  1. as far as I know...not yet. I know of these two studies: Van Oel, P.R. and Hoekstra, A.Y. (2012) Towards quantification of the water footprint of paper: A first estimate of its consumptive component,Water Resources Management, 26(3): 733-749. available at: http://www.waterfootprint.org/Reports/VanOel-Hoekstra-2012-WaterFootprintPaper.pdf UPM-Kymmene (2011) From forest to paper, the story of our water footprint, Helsinki, Finland. available at: http://www.waterfootprint.org/Reports/UPM-2011.pdf and a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfNHRmzNMSY But it would be great to see more in-depth studies. Please share if you happen to find any - or do one yourself.

  2. @ Markus, thanks for posting this article. I wonder do any one has done any research on virtual water trend in wood trading industry ? or some study related forestry and virtual water use etc?