• The world lost 4.3 million hectares of primary tropical forest in 2025, down 36% from 2024.
• Brazil drove the improvement, cutting forest loss to 1.63 million hectares.
• Despite progress, deforestation remains far above climate targets and equals more than 11 football fields per minute.

Global Forest Watch, a project of the World Resources Institute and the University of Maryland, reported on Wednesday, April 29 that the growth rate of global deforestation is declining, but not fast enough.

In 2025, the world lost 4.3 million hectares of primary tropical forest—defined as forests that human activity has not altered. This level marks a decline of about 36% compared with 2024, which recorded particularly severe losses. Agricultural expansion for commodity production and subsistence farming remained the main driver of forest loss, followed by fires.

Brazil drives a positive shift

According to Global Forest Watch, Brazil led the improvement in 2025. Brazil reduced forest loss to 1.63 million hectares, down from 2.82 million hectares in 2024, which significantly lowered the global average.

This trend reflects stronger enforcement policies under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who intensified efforts to combat illegal logging through expanded monitoring operations.

“For example, his administration relaunched the PPCDAm, a strategic framework to combat deforestation that coordinates the actions of 19 federal agencies and now covers all of the country’s biomes. First introduced in 2004, the PPCDAm had already delivered significant reductions in primary forest loss in the Amazon in the early 2000s. The enforcement component has also strengthened: the federal environmental agency IBAMA increased environmental violation notices by 81% and fines by 63% between 2023 and 2025, compared with the 2020–2022 period,” the report’s authors said.

During the same period, Madagascar recorded the highest proportional loss relative to its primary forest area, with a decline of 1.9%, equivalent to 90,000 hectares. Slash-and-burn agriculture and illegal extraction of sapphire and nickel in the Ankeniheny–Zahamena corridor drove much of the loss.

As in 2024, the Democratic Republic of the Congo ranked third globally in absolute forest loss, with 560,000 hectares cleared. Agricultural expansion, fuelwood harvesting and charcoal production—key energy sources—drove this trend.

According to the World Bank, biomass accounts for 98.8% of total household energy consumption in the country, including 81.8% from firewood and 17% from charcoal, while access to cleaner energy sources remains limited.

Progress falls short of climate targets

Despite the improvement, Global Forest Watch stressed that losses in 2025 still equal more than 11 football fields per minute, and remain 46% higher than a decade ago. Moreover, climate change is increasing forest vulnerability and risks turning these carbon sinks into net emission sources.

At the same time, deforestation remains far too high to meet the goals of the New York Declaration on Forests, under which governments committed to halting deforestation by 2030.

“The 2025 data shows that reducing forest loss is possible. The sharp declines in Brazil, combined with relatively low or stable deforestation levels in Colombia, Indonesia and Malaysia, demonstrate how policy choices, stronger law enforcement and corporate commitments can improve forest outcomes. At the same time, high losses in other regions highlight the need to sustain and scale up efforts to prevent forest destruction. With only a few years left before the 2030 deadline to halt and reverse global forest loss, countries must accelerate action,” the authors said.

This article was initially published in French by Espoir Olodo

Adapted in English by Ange J.A de Berry Quenum