Earth Home To 3 Trillion Trees, Half As Many As When Human Civilization Arose

sciencehabit writes: Earth today supports more than 3 trillion trees—eight times as many as we thought a decade ago. But that number is rapidly shrinking, according to a global tree survey released today (abstract). We are losing 15 billion trees a year to toilet paper, timber, farmland expansion, and other human needs. So even though the total count is large, the decline is "a cause for concern," says Tom Spies, a forest ecologist with the U.S. Forest Service in Corvallis, Oregon, who was not involved with the work.

Comments

Three Seashells

[The Rizz]

We are losing 15 billion trees a year to toilet paper

Looks like it's time to institute the Three Seashells.

Re:Three Seashells

[Firethorn]

would translate into a smaller footprint required to produce.

This brings up an important point that detracts from the article. Toilet paper and timber today are overwhelmingly produced from farmed trees. Timber is, generally speaking, sequestering the wood. Discounting the costs of processing and shipping, toilet paper is actually renewable. After all, after you harvest a field to make into TP, you simply plant more trees.

Remove them, and you might run into the problem seen by African Rhinos - where complete bans on their horns actually increases their vulnerability to poachers, because you've removed much of the economics of having them, thus reducing money available to protect them and even breed more of them.

Lions aren't easy to farm either, but at least the Chinese are doing it.

Re:Three Seashells

[lgw]

Not sure about the seashells, however I wonder if there might not be benefit in using say bamboo instead of traditional trees for paper products such as bumwad. It grows substantially faster and by my reckoning would translate into a smaller footprint required to produce.

No, it's not even relevant. As much as hippies like to pretend there's something you can do in your home to help the environment, this is not a US problem. Forest coverage in the US has grown substantially since the 50s, as crop yields increase there is simply less farmland, and more forest.

Almost all paper used in the US comes from tree farms, which are just a different kind of cropland, raised and harvested on a longer cycle than corn, but still a normal-ish cash crop.

At this point, increased paper use in the US likely increases forest coverage, as more land is used for tree farms to meet demand.

Most forest loss is simply not about paper use, but about clearing land for people to live and (mostly) farm, and we've seen that the pendulum eventually swings the other way, with high-tech farming taking so much less land.

Toilet paper and timber?

[ArmoredDragon]

Last I checked, trees earmarked for that purpose were specifically grown for that purpose, and aren't wild trees (thus when they're harvested, they don't count as a lost tree anymore than eating a potato counts as a lost potato.)

Namely, these kinds of farm raised trees:

https://photos.travelblog.org/...

Those kind of trees are even preferred over wild trees because their growth pattern is much better suited to their end purpose.

Re:Toilet paper and timber?

[pr0fessor]

If you would like to have more trees build a chain link fence... Mine appears to grow plenty of trees.

Re:Toilet paper and timber?

[EvilSS]

That's probably true in the US, at least from what I've heard, but is it true everywhere? China? India? South America?

Not sure about India and South America, but China is planting trees for paper production. They don't have a choice. They literally don't have enough natural forests left to support their paper production these days. China has become the world's largest producer of paper. They have been importing timber and pulp from all over the world for a while now but even that isn't sustainable forever. Their low prices have been kept that way by government subsidies for now.

There is a pretty good article on China's paper business on Pulitzer Center.

Re:Toilet paper and timber?

[thule]

It wouldn't make any sense to take a nice large, straight tree and turn it into paper of any sort. If you need a roof or wall, you have to start with a large straight tree. With paper, the tree is crushed. Why would you need a large straight tree for that? Economics re-enforces this. You're not going to pay extra for a large tree just to crush it

It amazes me that people think they are saving a tree when they don't use paper. I highly doubt they have even seen what kind of trees paper is made from. When I explain this, people usually tell me, "That makes sense." Of course it does!

This reminds me of the Mike Rowe's TED talk about how a lot of people talk about things they think they know. Until a person actually tries sheep farming, they really don't know a thing. I ask my dad (grew up on a farm) about the subject Mike Rowe covered in his talk, and sure enough, he knew about it.

Also of note, the abstract mentions that the number of trees has been too low in previous estimates. I wonder how this new estimate will change climate/CO2 modeling:

"This map reveals that the global number of trees is approximately 3.04 trillion, an order of magnitude higher than the previous estimate."

Our previous numbers were completely wrong.

[halivar]

But these new numbers are completely right, and actionable. I am inspired with confidence.

Regeneration

[tomhath]

FTFA:

They think that about 5 billion new trees are planted or sprout annually, yielding a net loss of 10 billion

They don't say where that number came from, most likely pulled from someplace where the Sun doesn't shine. When a section of forest is cleared either by cutting or burning the ground is soon covered in tree sprouts. Take a look at regeneration in Yellowstone National Park after the fires burned about 1/3 of it in the late 80's.

Bad article.

[pubwvj]

This /. article totally fails to cover the reality that the number of trees has gone up (entire planet covered) and down (almost no trees in ice ages) over the course of the Earth's life. That's how life is.

Help the poor- Plant a tree

[GoodNewsJimDotCom]

For about a decade, I've envisioned the way to help the poor in countries that get deforested is to replant some of their forests with fruit trees. Even if farmers don't farm, or the country sees unrest, the fruit trees remain. A steady source of food is good in third world countries. Thankfully 'Food For The Poor' saw this too and there is a program for planting fruit trees that I try and endorse to people. If we have a good job, and are on our feet, we should be helping our fellow man, and this is a good way to do that.

This is why we need industrial hemp for victory

[HongPong]

See the original 1942 propaganda film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

There is no reason to focus on wood for the paper supply - except the economics of state-imposed rules driving customers to buy solvents. It would be far better and less impactful to use hemp instead of trees for paper, TP and the rest of it. The consequences are huge!

Yeah but we have like 3 trillion more than mars

[netsavior]

Earth is still #1 in trees!