Richest nations ‘exporting extinction’ with demand for beef, palm oil and timber

The world’s wealthiest nations are “exporting extinction” by destroying 15 times more biodiversity internationally than within their own borders, research shows.

Most wildlife habitats are being destroyed in countries with tropical forest, according to the study which looked at how wealthy countries’ demand for products such as beef, palm oil, timber and soya beans is destroying biodiversity hotspots elsewhere.

It found that high-income nations were responsible for 13% of global loss of forest habitats outside their own borders. The US alone was responsible for 3% of the world’s non-US forest habitat destruction.

“That just underscores the magnitude of the process,” said lead researcher Alex Wiebe, a doctoral student in ecology and evolutionary biology at Princeton University in the US. Countries that had the most significant impacts abroad included the US, Germany, France, Japan, China and the UK, according to the paper, published in Nature.

Globally, habitat loss is the biggest threat to most species and about 90% is caused by conversion of wild habitats to agricultural land.

“By importing food and timber, these developed nations are essentially exporting extinction,” said Prof David Wilcove, co-author of the study from Princeton University. “Global trade spreads out the environmental impacts of human consumption, in this case prompting the more developed nations to get their food from poorer, more biodiverse nations in the tropics, resulting in the loss of more species.”

A lot of deforestation occurs in places with high levels of biodiversity, such as Indonesia, Brazil or Madagascar. Researchers say that analysing these patterns could help promote more targeted conservation and sustainable food production.

In a separate study, an international team of researchers led by the University of Cambridge found that reclaiming typical UK cropland for nature may be five times more damaging for global biodiversity. This process of “biodiversity leak” could mean that establishing new nature reserves results in a steeper decline in the planet’s species, according to the paper published in the journal Science.

“As nations in temperate regions such as Europe conserve more land, the resulting shortfalls in food and wood production will have to be made up somewhere,” said lead author Prof Andrew Balmford from the University of Cambridge. Much of this is likely to happen in less well-regulated parts of the world, such as Africa and South America.

“Areas of much greater importance for nature are likely to pay the price for conservation efforts in wealthy nations unless we work to fix this leak,” Balmford said. The authors say leakage could be reduced if there was less demand for high-footprint commodities such as beef. Conservation efforts should also target the most biodiverse areas, as well as areas where the potential for food production or timber is limited. There is also the potential for conservationists to work with farmers, such as creating forest-friendly chocolate or herding practices that also protect snow leopards, according to the paper.

The Nature study on exporting extinction looked at the impacts of 24 high-income nations (which included the world’s largest economies) on more than 7,500 forest-dependent species of birds, mammals and reptiles. They looked at data from 2001 to 2015, working out where forests had been destroyed, and what species they were home to.

They did not look at the types of crops being grown, but previous research shows that about 80% of agricultural land is used for meat and dairy production.

Countries tended to have the largest impacts on tropical forest species closest to them. The US, which caused the greatest amount of destruction outside its borders, has the most significant impact in Central America, while China and Japan have a greater impact on south-east Asian rainforests.

“By increasingly outsourcing their land use, countries have the ability to affect species around the world, even more than within their own borders,” said Wiebe. “This represents a major shift in how new threats to wildlife emerge.”

This article by Phoebe Weston was first published by The Guardian on 14 February 2025. Lead Image: A toucan in Costa Rica. Most wildlife habitats are being destroyed in countries with tropical forests, the study shows. Photograph: Francesco Puntiroli/Alamy.

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