Sadly, the truth is that we are all to blame. We demand the paper or burgers or whatever it is for which the tropical woods are consumed.
Ok, so you want to deny it or ignore it. That’s OK. Today. But tomorrow we’re all going to have to face the truth. Sooner or later we’ll have to stop. If you’re rich, you’ll be protected for longer, but scraping forests off the face of the earth is like scraping off the skin from your body. It might not be your skin, but sooner or later you’re going to be affected. And the consequences are similar: death.
Now for some of the detail. 
Around five football fields of tropical forest have been illegally cleared every minute between 2000 and 2012 according to a new report. Consumer demand in Europe and the US for beef, leather and timber is driving these losses. And in the first 12 years of this century, 49% of tropical deforestation was due to illegal conversion for commercial agriculture. So we’re all accessories to that crime.
Brazilian government figures show deforestation of the Amazon rainforest was 6,000 sq km. That’s the size of Palestine, or more than two Luxembourgs. The rate of deforestation is up by 29% in the 12 months up to the end of July 2013. Deforestation is due to agricultural expansion, illegal logging and the invasion of public lands adjacent to big infrastructure projects in the Amazon, such as roads and hydroelectric dams.
BBC: Demand for agricultural products drives ‘shock’ tree loss in tropical forests
BBC: Amazon rainforest destruction in Brazil rises again
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