Some common reasons of deforestation are: • To make more land available for housing and urbanisation • To harvest timber to create commercial items such as paper, furniture and homes • To create ingredients that are highly prizes consumer items, such as the oil from palm trees • To create room for cattle ranching Common methods of deforestation are burning trees and clear cutting. These tactics leave the land completely barren and are controversial practices. Clear cutting is when large swaths of land are cut down all at once. A forestry expert quoted by the Natural Resources Defence Council describes clear cutting as "an ecological trauma that has no precedent in nature except for a major volcanic eruption." Burning can be done quickly, in vast swaths of land, or more slowly with the slash-and-burn technique. Slash and burn agriculture entails cutting down a patch of trees, burning them and growing crops on the land. The ash from the burned ...
GEOGRAPHY FOR GEOGRAPHERS