While tropical deforestation rates declined in 2025, they remained critically high, with climate-driven fires posing a growing threat to global forest conservation efforts. Government policies in Brazil, Colombia, and Indonesia contributed to reductions, but agricultural expansion and weakened protections in some regions continue to drive destruction.

Deforestation Rates Decline, But Remain High

The pace of tropical forest destruction slowed in 2025 after record losses in 2024, but the rate of deforestation remained alarmingly high, equivalent to 11 football fields disappearing every minute. According to researchers from the World Resources Institute (WRI) and the University of Maryland, the world lost 4.3 million hectares (10.6 million acres) of tropical primary rainforest last year, marking a 36 percent decrease from the previous year.

A Temporary Lull?

While this decline is encouraging, experts caution that it may partly reflect a temporary lull following an extreme fire year rather than a sustained improvement. Elizabeth Goldman, co-director of WRI’s Global Forest Watch platform, emphasized that decisive government action can yield significant results. However, she warned that climate-driven fires have become a dangerous new normal, threatening to undo recent progress in curbing deforestation.

Climate Change and Fire Risk

The warming El Niño weather phenomenon, expected to return mid-year, could further escalate global temperatures, increasing the risk of heatwaves, droughts, and wildfires. Despite the reduction in forest loss, last year’s figures still represented an area roughly the size of Denmark and were 46 percent higher than a decade ago.

Long-Term Goals Remain Distant

Global forest loss remains 70 percent above the level needed to meet the 2030 goal of halting and reversing deforestation. Matthew Hansen, director of the GLAD Lab at the University of Maryland, stressed the need for sustained efforts, stating that a single good year is insufficient to conserve tropical rainforests.

Regional Variations in Forest Loss

Much of last year’s slowdown was attributed to Brazil, home to the world’s largest rainforest, where deforestation excluding fires dropped by 41 percent to its lowest recorded rate. This improvement was linked to stronger environmental policies and enforcement under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who relaunched an anti-deforestation action plan and increased penalties for environmental crimes.

Policy Impacts and Ongoing Challenges

However, agriculture remains the primary driver of forest loss in Brazil, as land is cleared for soy fields and cattle ranches. Some Amazonian states have even weakened environmental protections, posing ongoing threats. Other countries also demonstrated the impact of strong policy action. Colombia saw a 17 percent reduction in forest loss, its second-lowest year since 2016, due to government policies and agreements limiting forest clearing.

Indonesia, despite a 14 percent increase in forest loss, remained below the highs of a decade ago, thanks to government efforts. Malaysia similarly stabilized its forest loss through policy interventions. However, tropical forest destruction remained severe in regions like Bolivia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Cameroon, and Madagascar.

The Growing Threat of Fires

While agricultural expansion is the leading cause of tree cover loss in the tropics, fires accounted for 42 percent of global destruction last year. Over the past three years, fires have burned more than twice as much tree cover as they did two decades ago. Although human activity drives most tropical fires, climate change is intensifying natural fire cycles in northern and temperate regions.

Canada experienced its second-worst fire year on record, with wildfires ravaging 5.3 million hectares of forest. Hansen noted that climate change and land clearing have turned seasonal fire disturbances into a near-permanent state of emergency, underscoring the urgent need for global action to protect forests.