HABITAT LOSS HALVED OR REDUCED
2. Loss of other habitats at least halved 3. Degradation and fragmentation reduced
2
1 3
Figure 5.1. Annual rate of global forest expansion and deforestation.2
0
2000–102010–15 2015–20
2000–10
2010–15 2015–20 2000–10
2010–152015–20 2000–102010–15 2015–20
2000–10
2010–15 2015–20 2000–10
2010–15
2015–20 2015–20
2000–10 2010–15
World South America
Oceania North and
Central America Europe
Asia Africa
-16,000 -14,000 -12,000 -10,000 -8,000 -6,000 -4,000 -2,000 2,000 4,000 6,000 8,000 10,000 12,000 14,000 16,000
Forest expansion (1000 ha per year)Deforestation (1000 ha per year)
The black line on each bar shows the difference between forest expansion and deforestation (net forest loss/gain).
Figure 5.2. Loss of tree cover from tropical primary forests3
2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
millions of hectares
1 0 2 3 4 5 6 7
Annual tropical tree cover loss 3 year running average
Status
There are widely varying trends in different countries and regions of the world, with net forest gains in Asia, Oceania and Europe contrasting with continued net forest losses in Africa and South America. In the past decade, Africa has replaced South America to become the continent with the highest rate of net forest loss. The rate of net forest loss increased in Africa in each of the three decades since 1990, while since 2010 the rate of net forest loss in South America has roughly halved.5
A somewhat different picture emerges from analysis of satellite data through the Global Forest Watch initiative. This showed that the average annual loss of tree cover increased globally from approximately 17 million hectares per year in the first decade of this century to more than 21 million hectares per year during the period 2011-2019.6 In part, this discrepancy is due to different definitions
and methodologies regarding what is being
measured.7 Loss of tree cover from tropical primary forests has been particularly high in the second half of this decade (Figure 5.2). However, rates of primary forest loss have fallen in some countries.
A global database of mangrove forest cover developed in 2016 found that between 2000 and 2012 the rate of deforestation of mangrove had substantially decreased at the global level, but remained high in Southeast Asia where half of all mangroves are located. Figures are not yet available to assess the rate of mangrove loss during most of the period covered by this target.8
The area covered by natural wetlands has continued to decline, with the Wetland Extent Trends (WET) index having reduced by an average of 35% worldwide between 1970 and 2015. Losses have been relatively greater in coastal areas than RELEVANT SDG TARGET
Target 15.1 - By 2020, ensure the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of terrestrial and inland freshwater ecosystems and their services, in particular forests, wetlands, mountains and drylands, in line with obligations under international agreements
Target 15.2 - By 2020, promote the implementation of sustainable management of all types of forests, halt deforestation, restore degraded forests and substantially increase afforestation and reforestation globally
Target 15.5 - Take urgent and significant action to reduce the degradation of natural habitats, halt the loss of biodiversity and, by 2020, protect and prevent the extinction of threatened species
Figure 5.4. Wetland Extent Trends (WET) index relative to 1970 showing change from 2000-2015 in the extent of natural wetlands in six regions and globally.4
2002 2001 2000
1970 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
Africa Asia Europe Latin America & Caribbean North America Oceania Global
The indicator is indexed to a value of 1 in 1970. Note that the time series has been truncated between 1970 and 2000.
55 Strategic Goal B: Target 5 – Habitat loss halved or reduced
Box 5.1. Examples of national experiences and progress
ɠ Brazil: Deforestation in the Brazilian part of the Amazon biome has been monitored consistently using high-resolution satellite images since the 1990s by Brazil’s National Space Research Institute (INPE). The rate of deforestation fell by 84% from a high in 2004 to a low in 2012 thanks to Brazil’s Action Plan for Deforestation Prevention and Control in the Legal Amazon (Figure 5.3 ).
Over the current decade as a whole deforestation rates are less than half those in the previous decade. However, progress has not been sustained in recent years, with the most recent figures from satellite imagery showing that deforestation is on an upward trend. Deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon in 2019 showed the highest level since 2008, reaching over one million hectares.9 Preliminary data based on real-time deforestation alerts for the early months of 2020 showed a further substantial increase compared with 2019.
Figure 5.3. Annual deforestation rates for the Brazilian Amazon.10
ɠ Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana: From 2018 to 2019, the rate of forest loss was halved in both countries. Several policies and actions have contributed to this success including the Cocoa and Forest Initiative. The initiative is a partnership between the two countries and the World Cocoa Foundation, the Sustainable Trade Initiative, the International Sustainability Unit of the Office of the Prince of Wales, and private cocoa companies, to create an enabling environment for the cocoa sector to contribute positively to the preservation of forests and the economy of the two countries. The initiative takes a holistic approach to deforestation in cocoa production with a focus on sustainable production and farmers’ livelihoods, forest protection and restoration, and community engagement and social inclusion.11
ɠ Indonesia: Since 2016 the rate of primary forest loss has been decreasing and in 2019 it was 5%
lower than in 2018. This decline has been supported by various policies including a moratorium on permits for the use of primary natural forests. As a result of the moratorium, no rights to production or other use will be granted on a forest area of 66.4 million hectares.12
2002
2001 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
Cumulative Forest loss (KM2)
Annual Forest Loss (KM2)
0 50,000 100,000 150,000 200,000 250,000
0 5,000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000
Annual forest loss Cumulative forest loss
57 Strategic Goal B: Target 5 – Habitat loss halved or reduced
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
The colour bars show the percentage of Parties reporting a given level of progress towards their national targets. (Blue: exceeds target; Green: on track; Yellow: some progress; Red: no change;
Purple: moving away from target). The intensity of the colour indicates alignment of national targets with the Aichi Target (Darker colours indicate close alignment).
Assessment of progress towards national targets
inland areas. Latin America and the Caribbean showed the greatest loss of wetlands. During the same period, the area covered by human-made wetlands more than doubled. The rate of wetland loss remained fairly constant after 2011 compared with the previous period (Figure 5.4).13 Permanent surface water was lost from an area of almost nine million hectares between 1984 and 2015, approx-imately the equivalent of Lake Superior. Seventy per cent of this loss was located in the Middle East and Central Asia, linked to drought and human actions including damming and diverting rivers, and unregulated withdrawal. Over the same period, new permanent bodies of water covering more than 18 million hectares have formed elsewhere, largely from reservoir filling.14
In addition to loss in extent, habitats suffer significant and continuing fragmentation and other forms of degradation. A recent study of more than 130 million tropical forest fragments on three conti-nents found that forest fragmentation was close to a critical point, beyond which fragments will greatly increase in number and reduce in size, but that these consequences could be partly mitigated by reforestation and forest protection.15
Rivers are becoming increasingly fragmented, further threatening freshwater biodiversity. An assessment in 2019 of the connectivity status of 12 million kilometres of rivers globally found that only 37 per cent of rivers longer than 1,000 kilometres remained free-flowing over their entire length, and just 23 per cent flowed uninterrupted to the ocean.16
Overall, an estimated 3.3 million square kilometres of wilderness has been lost since the early 1990s, accounting for nearly one tenth of the total wilderness remaining at that time. In this context, wilderness refers to landscapes that are largely intact and relatively free of human
disturbance – although many are occupied by and essential for indigenous peoples and local commu-nities. Wilderness provides critical strongholds for endangered biodiversity, for carbon storage and sequestration, for regulating local climates and for supporting many of the world’s most marginalized communities. The largest losses of wilderness took place in South America (29.6% loss) and Africa (14% loss). By 2015, less than one quarter of the Earth’s land surface (23.2%) was estimated to remain as wilderness.17
The Red List Index for species specialized to specific habitats provides a further indication of the continuing impact on biodiversity from loss and degradation of habitat. The index for forest specialist species shows that species of birds, mammals, amphibians and cycads dependent on forests for their habitat are, on average, moving closer to extinction (see also Aichi Target 12).18
More than three quarters (79%) of NBSAPs contain targets related to Aichi Biodiversity
Target 5. Of the Parties that have assessed progress, fewer than a third are on track to reach (28%) or exceed (1%) them. A further 56% of Parties have made progress towards their targets but 13% report no progress and a few (2%) are moving away from it. Fewer than a tenth of national targets (8%) are similar in scope and level of ambition to the Aichi Target. The targets that reference specific habitats most commonly refer to forests. Mangroves, coral reefs, rivers, rangeland and marine environ-ments are also mentioned, but to a much lesser extent. Few national targets specify the percentage by which the rate of habitat loss is to be reduced, and few explicitly refer to habitat degradation or fragmentation. Only 4% of reporting Parties have national targets of similar scope and ambition to Aichi Biodiversity Target 5 and are on track to meet them (see bar chart).