Another misleading denier OP, based on an article from a disingenuous author. The OP is one of lazy research where burden of proof and evidence of fact is a foreign concept.
In the linked article is the NASA report that puts the “Global Drop in Fires” in proper context. The following are three excerpts therefrom with the link given further below:
“Across Africa, fires collectively burned an area about half the size of the continental United States every year. In traditional savanna cultures, people often set fires to keep grazing lands productive and free of shrubs and trees. But as many of these communities have shifted to cultivating permanent fields and building more houses, roads, and villages, the use of fire has declined. As this economic development continues, the landscape becomes more fragmented and communities then enact legislation to control fires. This leads the burned area to decline even more.”
“A slightly different pattern occurs in tropical forests and other humid regions near the equator. Fire rarely occurs naturally in these forests; but as humans settle an area, they often use fire to clear land for cropland and pastures. As more people move into these areas and increase the investments in agriculture, they set fewer fires and the burned area declines again.”
“The impact of a warming and drying climate is more obvious at higher latitudes, where fire has increased in Canada and the American West. Regions of China, India, Brazil, and southern Africa also showed increases in burned area.”
Researchers Detect a Global Drop in Fires
In summary, it’s man’s PURPOSEFUL USE of fire that has declined and less area in those regions that has any savannahs and tropical forests left, after being converted to farmland and housing, etc., to burn at all.
To add more fuel to the fire, let’s look at where there is still a great deal of forest, and where unlike Africa and SA there is no purposeful burning to clear land, compared to the rest of the world. North America. All you need to do is eyeball the NA list of wildfires in the article in the link below and you should be able to figure it out:
List of wildfires - Wikipedia
As for the reforestation mislead, please read the following excerpts taken from the link further below:
Deforestation Rates
“The United States lost an average of 384,350 hectares (949,750 acres) of forest each year between 1990 and 2010. A total of almost 4 million hectares (10 million acres) of timber is harvested each year, but most of that timber regenerates and remains classified as forested land, albeit at a different successional stage. So the deforestation here refers to lands that are converted from forest to some other purpose. Deforestation could increase in the future because tree pests and diseases such as bark beetles are becoming more prevalent in the face of climate change.”
Reforestation Rates
“In the United States, deforestation has been more than offset by reforestation between 1990 and 2010. The nation added 7,687,000 hectares (18,995,000 acres) of forested land during that period.”
Rates of Deforestation & Reforestation in the U.S. | Education - Seattle PI
When an area of forest is cleared for timber, the trees are marked for which ones to remove and which to leave. When that happens, that area is still considered “forested”. Not a whole lot is left and, quite expectedly, are not of timber size. Obviously, it’s the same with replanted areas that are then considered “forested” but won’t be of timber size for at least 30 years for the relatively fast-growing Douglas Fir tree so often used in building.
Another OP of lazy, insignificant research or understanding of context for no reason other than to throw-in another poorly supported anti-science line like
“These alarmist sources tend to ignore the positive, and give a false narrative of the bigger picture.”
