Last great regions of pristine wilderness from Asia to Amazon under threat

Last great regions of pristine wilderness from Asia to Amazon under threat from massive road-building projects, scientist warns - World - News - The Independent



The last great regions of pristine wilderness – from Asia to the Amazon – are threatened by an unprecedented road-building programme financed by aggressive development banks with little interest in protecting the natural world, a leading environmental scientist has warned. Massive infrastructure and road-building are at the heart of huge development projects around the world, justified as vital attempts at helping the poorest attain a higher standard of living.

Scientists claim that we are living in the most explosive era of road and infrastructure expansion in human history – from the plains of the Serengeti to the rainforests of Sumatra. By 2050, they estimate, there will be an additional 25 million kilometres (15.5 million miles) of new paved roads globally, enough to circle the Earth 600 times. Approximately 90 per cent of these new roads will be built in the developing world, and many of these will result in the first deep cuts into areas of pristine tropical rainforests to service the building of new mines and hydroelectric dams in some of the remotest places on earth.

Here we go again, spoiled western Eco extremists wishing to deny a better life to people of color

Development lifts people out of poverty. Right not people in poverty are destroying Eco systems wholesale just to grow enough to eat