The first major issue threatening the life on this land is deforestation. Forests cover about 30% of the world’s land and they are disappearing at an alarming rate. From 1990 to 2016 we have lost about 502,000 square miles of our forest; that’s about an area larger than South Africa. 

Trees play an important role in our ecosystem. They not only absorb the carbon dioxide humans emit but they also trap green house gases that otherwise would warm the earth causing climate change. According to the Paris agreement treaty of 2015, tropical trees can provide 23% of climate mitigation which would help regulate climate change for many years. 

More than half of the causes of deforestation happen because of  farming, grazing, mining, and drilling combined. The other half comes from wild fires, forestry practices, and urbanization. For example in Malaysia and Indonesia, forest are destroyed to harvest palm oil. Which is found in everything from shampoo to saltines. The Amazon rain forest is also cut down for cattle ranching which in turn, damages the organisms living there.

Logging operations are also a key Culprit in deforestation. They build roads and destroy the life in these forests. That is why deforestation is a major problem affecting life on land and should be stopped.