Illegal logging may have contributed to Philippines disaster

[ThoughtCriminal]

Very sad - 1500 maybe as many as 3000 dead, but it's not getting much attention.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002812134_webslideside17.html

<snip>
Pat Vendetti, a London-based campaigner with the Greenpeace environmental action group, said illegal logging may prove to have contributed to the mudslide.

"There were similar landslides at the end of 2004 and the end of 2003, both directly linked to illegal logging on land above villages, and both in the Philippines," said Vendetti.

Vendetti said the country had lost about 8.5 million acres of forest in the last 15 years, "roughly equivalent to the size of Belgium." He said that although logging is illegal in the Philippines, a combination of poor governance and corruption has hampered enforcement of the law.
<snip>

[kittykatkoffeekup]

1. Not really surprising

Here is a scientific report about landslides, their causes, and their economic impact. (Warning-long read)

http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2001/ofr-01-0276/

Excerpt from report.


Related to increases in population is the continuing high rate of deforestation due to logging, burning, and development, a factor that increases landslide activity on the world’s slopes. In the early 1990’s, the World Resources Institute estimated that the world’s tropical forests were disappearing at a rate of 16-20 million ha/yr (Collier’s Encyclopedia, 1997), an area roughly the size of Suriname. In the Amazon River Basin of Brazil, alone, approximately 2.9 million ha of forest was destroyed during the 1994-95 burning season (Facts on File News Services, 1998).

[no_hypocrisy]

2. Parents are receiving textmessages from their children trapped in their

school, begging to be rescued. Beyond tragic.

[leftchick]

3. that was my very first thought

greed Kills. :(