Geography Assignment: Exploring the Ecological Impact of Deforestation

This essay explores the ecological impact of deforestation, highlighting its direct effects on soil, atmosphere, water cycle, and biodiversity, as well as its indirect effects on the spread of infectious diseases. Deforestation, driven by the need for agriculture, civilization development, and wood acquisition, leads to habitat loss, altered water body characteristics (increased nitrogen, decreased oxygen, and increased temperature), and a significant increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases. The depletion of nutrients in forest soils and the rise in climate change-related infectious diseases further exacerbate the ecological consequences. The paper references several studies to support its claims, emphasizing the urgent need to address deforestation to mitigate its far-reaching ecological effects. Desklib provides access to this and other solved assignments for students.

Running head: GEOGRAPHY ASSIGNMENT
ECOLOGICAL IMPACT OF DEFORESTATION
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1GEOGRAPHY ASSIGNMENT
Deforestation is the process, which is done to provide space for agriculture, or to develop
civilization, to obtain wood and lumber and for the survival of the mankind (Zemp et al., 2017).
However, excessive rate of deforestation has emerged as the primary reason for global warming,
affecting majority of the wild life and increasing the sea levels (Tan, Feng & Hwang, 2016).
Further, deforestation is also causing majority of the natural calamities due to which the world is
suffering from several impacts, and ecological impact is one of them, this paper would be
discussing.
The effect of deforestation could be directly witnessed on aspects such as soil,
atmosphere, water cycle and ground water level, biodiversity and increasing number of diseases
around the world. As Zemp et al. (2017) mentions, majority of species habitats n the forests and
vegetations around the world, deforestation has a direct impact on their existence as it causes
their extinction from the land (Tan, Feng & Hwang, 2016). Further, due to deforestation, several
rivers, ponds, lakes streams and other water bodies has shown different characteristics such as
increased nitrogen level, decreased oxygen level and increased temperature that usually not
witnessed in water bodies near forest, hence affecting the water habitat. As per Li et al. (2016),
due to deforestation, the amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere as increased thrice the
amount it was in 2010, thereby causing the change in environmental ecology. In forests, on the
other hand, soils are able to hold important nutrients and minerals which is depleting due to the
increased amount of deforestation (Tan, Feng & Hwang, 2016). The final effect of deforestation
is indirect as due to climate change majority of the bacteria and virus are causing infectious
diseases among population, thereby affecting us directly (García-Morales et al., 2016).

2GEOGRAPHY ASSIGNMENT
References
García-Morales, R., Moreno, C. E., Badano, E. I., Zuria, I., Galindo-González, J., Rojas-
Martínez, A. E., & Ávila-Gómez, E. S. (2016). Deforestation impacts on bat functional
diversity in tropical landscapes. PloS one, 11(12), e0166765.
Li, Y., Zhao, M., Mildrexler, D. J., Motesharrei, S., Mu, Q., Kalnay, E., ... & Wang, K. (2016).
Potential and Actual impacts of deforestation and afforestation on land surface
temperature. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 121(24).
Tan, P. Y., Feng, Y., & Hwang, Y. H. (2016). Deforestation in a tropical compact city (Part A)
Understanding its socio-ecological impacts. Smart and Sustainable Built
Environment, 5(1), 47-72.
Zemp, D. C., Schleussner, C. F., Barbosa, H. D. M. J., & Rammig, A. (2017). Deforestation
effects on Amazon forest resilience. Geophysical Research Letters, 44(12), 6182-6190.