Summing It Up -- AT YEAR'S END, ENVIRONMENTAL NUMBERS TELL THE
STORY Editors: This story may be used as is or edited, with or
without credit to the Tropical Conservation Newsbureau. For more
information, call Paul Ewing at the Rainforest Alliance in New
York, 212/941-1900. Carlos Camarena Medina in Panama City
contributed to this report. SAN JOSE, Costa Rica, December 30,
1992 -- Environmentalists often use annual statistics to measure
changes in the planet's health. It's a way to judge progress as
well as the growing threats to the global environment. Now, as
they change calendars to a new year, conservationists, like
accountants, are reviewing gains, losses and annual projections.
In tropical areas such as Central America, environmental changes
occur so rapidly that the annual evaluation leaves conservationists
with mixed feelings of hope and desperation. Here are some of the
annual increments that help sum up the situation in the tropics:
* At least 42 million acres of tropical forest are lost each year,
an area the size of Washington State. This equals about 100 acres
a minute. * An estimated 50,000 species of plants and animals,
mostly plants and invertebrates and mostly in the tropics, are
condemned to extinction every year, an average of about 140 a day.
* Cultures are going extinct, too. Since the turn of the century,
90 tribes of indigenous peoples have been wiped out in Brazil
alone. The pace of annihilation is increasing; 26 of those tribes
were killed or scattered in the past decade. * About 95 million
people were added to the world's population in 1992. The
population growth rate in Central America is 2.8 percent, the
second highest in the world after Africa. The region's population
will double in about 20 years. * Each year, Latin American and
Caribbean nations transfer $20 to $30 billion to the industrialized
world. Meanwhile, 44 percent of the labor force of this same
region is unemployed. At least 70 percent of Central Americans
live in poverty. * Thirty-one percent of Central America is land
fit for farming, but land distribution is unequal. In 1992, 80
percent of the population lived on 25 percent of the land. * Last
year, the average North American burned energy equivalent to 40
barrels of oil; the average Mexican about seven barrels. Latin
America emitted about 18 percent of the world's carbon dioxide
pollution last year, adding to global warming; the United States
generated about 23 percent. In Central America, environmentalists
use regional and local statistics to make their case to the public
and to those in the corridors of government. Conservation leader
Juan Carlos Navarro of Panama says, "No one likes to be the bearer
of bad tidings, but numbers are a way of waking people up -- a way
to help everyone see the magnitude of the crisis."
Environmentalists like Navarro, who directs the Panamanian
conservation group ANCON, work day-by-day under the whip of global,
regional and local challenges that can be summed up in statistics.
In Central America, a region the size of California and Oregon
combined, almost one million acres are deforested every year.
Almost 65 percent of the region has been deforested to make cattle
pasture, aggravating economic and environmental woes. Sixty
percent of the region's 20 million people rely on firewood for
cooking, putting further pressure on the remaining forest. To
maintain balance and good spirits, environmentalists try to focus
on the positive numbers. Navarro, for example, might point to this
statistic: 121,000 acres. That's the size of a new park, a
forested island, that was given legal protection in Panama in 1992.
In Nicaragua, where an estimated 200,000 acres of forest were lost
last year, conservationists note that three large forest and marine
reserves were created. More positive numbers: Almost 50,000
acres were reforested in Central America last year. Ecotourism is
surging in the region, bringing money and political clout to
conservation efforts. About 10 percent of the region is now in
parks and reserves, and an average of 4.5 new parks are added each
year. There are dozens of groups -- more than 30 in tiny El
Salvador alone -- that are successfully working to improve the
standard of living in rural communities by combining conservation
and sustainable development. Costa Rica's Minister of Natural
Resources, Hernan Bravo, says, "Unfortunately, it's easier to
quantify environmental destruction than environmental progress.
Much of the progress we've made can't be measured -- changes in
attitude and increased awareness."