A comprehensive new analysis of illegal deforestation released last week estimates that almost half (49%) of all recent tropical deforestation is the result of illegal clearing for commercial agriculture.

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The study also found that the majority of this illegal and unsustainable land use change was driven by overseas demand for agricultural commodities including palm oil, beef, soy, and wood products. The clearances are estimated to produce 1.47 gigatonnes of carbon each year – equivalent to 25% of the EU's annual fossil fuel-based emissions.

The report was published by US-based NGO Forest Trends, though authors noted that figures were obtained using conservative estimates based on documented violations of significant impact. "There is hardly a product on supermarket shelves that is not potentially tainted," according to lead author Sam Lawson.

Forest Trends' President Michael Jenkins commented, "We've known that the production of agricultural commodities is a principal driving force behind deforestation, but this is the first report to show the outsize role that illegal activities play in the production of hundreds of food and household products consumed worldwide."

"Increased agricultural production will be necessary for food security," Jenkins continued. "However, the world must also wake up to the scale of how much of this agricultural production is taking place on land that has been illegally cleared. Urgent action is needed to help countries where these agricultural products are being grown, both for governments to enforce their own laws and regulations, and for businesses aiming to produce commodities legally and sustainably."

In the forests of Indonesia, an estimated 80 percent of recent deforestation is illegal – mostly driven to accommodate large-scale plantations producing palm oil and timber. In Brazil, 90 percent was found to be illegal between 2000 and 2012, though most illegal clearance occurred before 2004, when the government began taking steps to tackle the problem.

Forest Trends found that illegal deforestation is also "rampant in most other countries across Asia, Latin America, and Africa losing large areas of tropical forest," including Papua New Guinea, where a recent parliamentary inquiry revealed that 90 percent of licenses for clearing forests were the products of fraud or corruption, and Tanzania, where forests have been razed to make way for biofuel crops.  

Report author Sam Lawson elaborated, "All over the tropics, companies are bribing officials to obtain permits, trampling the legal or customary rights of Indigenous Peoples and other forest-dwelling communities, clearing more forest than they are allowed, and causing pollution and environmental devastation by flouting the law."

Export Agriculture a Key Driver of Illegal Deforestation

According to the report, the international trade in agricultural commodities (beef, leather, soy, palm oil, and wood products, including paper) produced on land illegally converted from tropical forest is worth an estimated $61 billion (£38bn) per year. The EU, China, India, Russia, and the US are among the largest buyers of these commodities.

Overall, exports of agricultural commodities produced on land where forests were illegally cleared drove 25% of all tropical deforestation between 2000 and 2012. The study estimates that almost 40% of all palm oil and a fifth of all soy come from land that has been illegally deforested.

Though the study highlights Brazil's recent success in reducing illegal forest clearance, illegal deforestation, driven by desire to produce commodities for export, is now expanding to new areas of the tropics where deforestation rates have traditionally been low.

The report's authors said that, although demonstrations of 'corporate responsibility', including 'zero deforestation' commitments made by a number of large companies, are to be applauded, the scale of the problem means that it "can ultimately only be fully addressed by governments [otherwise] efforts to go further than legality will be held back by the need to compete with products that were illegally produced."

"Without investing in governance, our collective investments in halting deforestation and promoting forest stewardship will fail," concluded Jenkins. "Responsible companies and environmental and human rights groups are likely to be supportive of processes to reform the complex, conflicting, and unclear laws and regulations that currently govern the forest and agricultural sectors. This is a critical step, alongside improving the enforcement and compliance of national and international laws. All must be prioritized if global commitments to stop tropical deforestation are going to be achieved."

"The current unfettered access to international markets for commodities from illegally cleared land is undermining the efforts of tropical countries to enforce their own laws," added Lawson. "Consumer countries have a responsibility to help halt this trade."