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| A patch of agricultural field bordering forest land in Southern Western Ghats in Kerala. (Image Credit: Indian Biodiversity Talks) |
A new study about forest cover loss shows that protected
areas (PAs) in Western Ghats were able to slow down the rate of deforestation.
However, in areas with high population density, deforestation rates are higher
even in the PAs.
Published in the Biological Conservation journal, the study
shows that the forest loss inside protect areas was 32 percent less than that
in other areas. However, the scenario is different in case of PAs
near dense human populations where there is a higher possibility of losing the
forest cover. “Where local human populations were higher in the Western Ghats,
protected areas were 70% more likely to lose forest cover than non-protected
areas”, says the study.
