A study has shown that deforestation has made outdoor labor unsafe for millions of people in tropics over the last 15 years.
People are less likely to work during the day due to the increase in humidity and temperatures caused by tree fall, especially those who perform heavy labour.
These tropics areas are already at the edge of what is safe or comfortable to work in the late morning to early afternoon due to climate change. Luke ParsonsDuke University, North Carolina climate researcher and the lead author of The paper was published in the journal One Earth. You can also add deforestation to this, which makes these regions even more hazardous work environments.
A An increasing number of studiesEvidence has shown that the increase in local temperature is linked to deforestation. cooling benefits treesBring to an area. For example, temperatures in areas of Brazil’s Amazon have been 10C higher in the past two decades than in forested regions.
The researchers analyzed satellite and meteorological data from 2003 to 2018 in 94 countries with tropical rainforests, looking at temperature, humidity, and precipitation.
Nearly 100,000 people, 90% of them living in Asia, lost more than two hours per day. Nearly 5,000,000 people have lost at most half an hour of safe working time each day. The majority of these are outdoor workers who do heavy physical labour.
The effects are most noticeable in deforested areas. In the Americas, 5 percent of forested areas lost at minimum half an hour of work time each day, while 35% of the deforested areas experienced the same loss.
Parsons stated that we couldn’t visit every place where people are employed and measure when they stopped working. While we can assess lost safe work time, people may choose to work in too hot or humid conditions, which could be detrimental to their health.
Continued global warming and forest losses Expected to amplify these impactsOver the next decade, we will see a reduction in work hours for those most vulnerable.
According to the study, heat exposure could cause mood and mental illness, as well reduce physical and psychological performance. Beatriz OliveiraThis study was not conducted by a researcher at Sergio Arouca National School of Public Health, Brazil.
According to the researchers, their findings offer local communities an economic incentive to preserve intact local forests in addition to environmental benefits.
