What real effect does deforestation
have on a country, a community and an environment? Having grown up
in a developing country I have seen a lot of deforestation in person,
and I would like to explore in more depth the pros and cons involved
in such use of forests. Some of the questions that need to be answered are:
What good does deforestation bring? What people are benefiting from
this? Who is being harmed by this? And, is such poor management of
natural resources a normal part of the progression process that
countries go through? I have entered this inquiry with the tentative
idea that deforestation is a part of a country's maturing process,
and that the countries experiencing the most acute problems are in
the same stage of their development that many Western countries
experienced during the nineteenth century. I have entered into this
research with a reasonable amount of personal experience with the
subject of deforestation. Frankly, I must admit that my preconceived
ideas about economics and history make me inclined to think that
deforestation is not as much a problem as many would like to say it
is. Still, I grew up in a rainforest, and have noticed in my own
lifetime the changes occurring in the area around my home. In the
last ten years I have seen the forest get less dense and begin to
shrink; when I was small the trees came to within a hundred feet
of our house, and then the three hundred foot tall wall of
vegetation just rose abruptly from the ground. Now, the forest is at
least three hundred feet away, and there is no more wall, just a sort
of gradual fade into short trees and brush that leads eventually to
taller trees. As any reader can see, I have my feet planted on both
sides of this topic, and I am very interested to find out the truth
about deforestation in developing countries.
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