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Forest_Loss_from_Urbanization_and_Commodity_Development (Map Service)


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Researchers used satellite imagery to develop a forest loss classification model and assign a driver of forest loss for each 10x10 km parcel of land globally between 2001 and 2015. Their findings, published September 14 in Science, show that 27 percent of global forest loss can be attributed to permanent land use conversion for the production of commodities such as palm oil, mining or energy infrastructure. Urbanization is another form of semi-permanent forest conversion, but it was estimated to account for less than 1 percent of global forest loss. The remainder of the forests were lost to things like shifting cultivation, forestry and wildfire—scenarios in which eventual forest regrowth remains possible.

“It’s important to note that not all forest loss is necessarily permanent,” said Alexandra Tyukavina, a post-doctoral associate with the UMD Department of Geographical Sciences and a co-author on the study. “However, our work reveals the stark reality that more than a quarter of the forests lost in the last 15 years or so represent deforestation—meaning they are not re-growing any time soon.”

Results also indicate that, despite recent commitments from nearly 450 companies worldwide to end deforestation in their supply chains by 2020, the rate of commodity-driven deforestation did not decline between 2001 and 2015.

The data were originally published in a paper titled: Classifying drivers of global forest loss by Philip G. Curtis, Christy M. Slay, Nancy L. Harris, Alexandra Tyukavina and Matthew C. Hansen.

This layer was developed for chapter two, "The Living Land", of an ongoing series of Story Maps on the Anthropocene. It was designed to be used with any dark themed basemap.

Source data can be found here.

Supplemental information:
This data set is intended for use at the global or regional scale, not for individual pixels. Individual grid cells may have more than one driver of tree cover loss, with variation over space and time.
Aside from the commodity-driven deforestation and urbanization classes, which are assumed to represent permanent conversion from a forest to non-forest state, this data set does not indicate the stability or changing condition of the forest land use after the tree cover loss occurs. The data set also does not distinguish between natural or anthropogenic wildfires.
The accuracy of the data was assessed using a validation sample of 1,565 randomly selected grid cells. The overall accuracy of the model was 89%, with individual class accuracies ranging from 55% (urbanization) to 94% (commodity-driven deforestation).


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Researchers used satellite imagery to develop a forest loss classification model and assign a driver of forest loss for each 10x10 km parcel of land globally between 2001 and 2015. Their findings, published September 14 in Science, show that 27 percent of global forest loss can be attributed to permanent land use conversion for the production of commodities such as palm oil, mining or energy infrastructure. Urbanization is another form of semi-permanent forest conversion, but it was estimated to account for less than 1 percent of global forest loss. The remainder of the forests were lost to things like shifting cultivation, forestry and wildfire—scenarios in which eventual forest regrowth remains possible.

“It’s important to note that not all forest loss is necessarily permanent,” said Alexandra Tyukavina, a post-doctoral associate with the UMD Department of Geographical Sciences and a co-author on the study. “However, our work reveals the stark reality that more than a quarter of the forests lost in the last 15 years or so represent deforestation—meaning they are not re-growing any time soon.”

Results also indicate that, despite recent commitments from nearly 450 companies worldwide to end deforestation in their supply chains by 2020, the rate of commodity-driven deforestation did not decline between 2001 and 2015.

The data were originally published in a paper titled: Classifying drivers of global forest loss by Philip G. Curtis, Christy M. Slay, Nancy L. Harris, Alexandra Tyukavina and Matthew C. Hansen.

This layer was developed for chapter two, "The Living Land", of an ongoing series of Story Maps on the Anthropocene. It was designed to be used with any dark themed basemap.

Source data can be found here.

Supplemental information:
This data set is intended for use at the global or regional scale, not for individual pixels. Individual grid cells may have more than one driver of tree cover loss, with variation over space and time.
Aside from the commodity-driven deforestation and urbanization classes, which are assumed to represent permanent conversion from a forest to non-forest state, this data set does not indicate the stability or changing condition of the forest land use after the tree cover loss occurs. The data set also does not distinguish between natural or anthropogenic wildfires.
The accuracy of the data was assessed using a validation sample of 1,565 randomly selected grid cells. The overall accuracy of the model was 89%, with individual class accuracies ranging from 55% (urbanization) to 94% (commodity-driven deforestation).


Copyright Text: P. Curtis et al. 2018. Classifying global drivers of forest loss. Science. Vol. 361, p. 1108, September 14, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aau3445

Spatial Reference:
102100

Single Fused Map Cache: true

Capabilities: Map,TilesOnly

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Full Extent:
Min Scale: 5.91657527591555E8
Max Scale: 4622324.434309

Min LOD: 0
Max LOD: 7

Units: esriMeters

Supported Image Format Types: Mixed

Export Tiles Allowed: false
Max Export Tiles Count: 100000

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