APR 2020

A story of where the land lies and

5 very important numbers to know and understand

5 ENVIRONMENTAL

NUMBERS
TO KNOW

COMPILED BY LASTOBJECT
 Welcome to our mini e-book! We’ll be going over five very

important environmental facts that everyone should know about

the world.

A lot of the information was gathered from the amazing folks

over at Yale who released a Environmental Protection Index with

tons of great facts and info. In these times of quiet and

reflection, it’s an amazing opportunity to learn and expand our

knowledge on the issues we care about.

This way we can be better suited to bring change, support, and

improvements to those issues of the world. 

Sit on down, grab a drink or a snack,

and enjoy!
42.000.000

trees are cut

down daily

50% better access

to clean

water

50% live

with unsafe

air quality

1/3 of fishing is

overfishing

80% untreated

wastewater
FOREST
Why are trees being cut down?

Commodity-driven deforestation (27%)

agriculture, mining, oil or gas production

Forestry (26%)
Wood, paper, tissues production

Shifting Agriculture (24%)

Land burned to recuperate after agriculture

Wildfire (23%)
Some caused by global warming, some natural

42.000.000
trees are cut down daily

Since humans started

cutting down forests, almost

50% of trees have been

felled

We have gone from 60% to

30% of the planet is covered

by forest
 FORESTS
thinking about an even bigger

number, this equates to about 53

billion trees annually. For me

personally, I can’t even picture 42

million trees...who am I kidding, I

can’t picture one million!

Forests are half our earth’s lungs,

one lung if you will. The other lung is

our oceans. Forests not only provide

the world with beautiful oxygen to

breathe, they also take the nasty

carbon (that we’re creating too much

53 billion globally....42 million daily,
of) out of the air.
that’s a lot of trees. So why are we

cutting down so many trees?

There are four group causes which

Shifting Agricuture
are spread out almost equally.

Wildfires

Commodity-driven Forestry
27% 26%

Forests are, and have

been, at risk.
Wildfire Shifting Agriculture
42 million trees are cut down every, 23% 24%
single, day. And in case you prefer
 trees cut down. Forestry refers to

things that require trees as the raw

27%
material such as:

Wood and lumber (like your house,

shelves, couch, furniture or cooking

Commodity driven spoons)

agriculture
Paper (you know...for like...writing

on and stuff)

Tissues! (hence LastTissue)

Still, the one that comes out on top

is Commodity driven agriculture

which accounts for 27%. This is

comprised of things like: 

24%
Agriculture (growing food and

plants, and raising animals)

Mining (for coal, metals, that

precious diamond on our rings, etc.)

Shifting Agricuture
Oil and gas production (for things

like fuel, energy, and plastics)

And the bronze trophy (which was

extracted from a mine contributing

to deforestation) goes to Shifting

Agriculture

26%
at 24%! Shifting

agriculture is when land is cleared

and burned in order to plant crops.

Once the crops are harvested, they

Forestry
(usually) let the land regenerate

back.

However, it’s a little complicated and

this one’s a little tough to explain, so

I’ll do what I do best and let

Forestry get’s 2nd place, but not in someone else do that!

a good way. It accounts for 26% of

“In parts of Peru,

shifting cultivation

cycles are well-

managed and
23%
contribute to a stable Wildfires
mosaic landscape of

agriculture and

regenerated forest. In And for 4th place, not quite podium

but hey, maybe one day, Wildfires .

other areas, such as in
Contributing to 23% of forest loss,

Democratic Republic wildfires are no joke. This is also a

weird one because wildfires can be

of the Congo, rapid seen as a natural phenomenon,

which they certainly can be. In this

population growth is
case, fires can actually be beneficial

intensifying pressure as part of an essential cycle of

nature.

on land, leading to
However, a good portion of wildfires
shorter fallow periods,
are far from natural either being

reduced opportunities caused directly by humans, or also

partially by climate change which

for forest can affect the frequency of

wildfires.
regeneration, and

long-term forest
The planet has gone
degradation.”
from 60% covered in
- When a Tree Falls
forests to now 30%

if we don’t change our ways of life

They go on to talk about how this
now, that percentage will continue
can be an issue for carbon storage
to shrink as the negative
and biodiversity that local areas
consequences continue to grow.
depend on.
WATER

Yay!

The number of people

lacking access to clean

water has been cut in half

the last 20 years

What it mean:
Access to clean water describes the

portion of a country's population with

access to an improved drinking water

source a main source.

 WATER

Access to clean drinking water and

proper sanitation is something that is

So essential that not having it has
half ‘really good news’ and half 
such drastic effects on people and
‘there’s still work to be done.’
the planet.

We have decreased “Inadequate access to

the number of people safe drinking water
without clean
and sanitation sickens
drinking water by
50%! and kills thousands of

Shifting Agricuture
children every day.
Wildfires
In 2000 , the number of people Poor sanitation
without clean water was 960
degrades the quality
million . As of2016 , t h a t n u m b e r i s
now down to 550 million people . of life for million of

While it would be amazing for that people, exacerbates

number to be zero ten years ago, it
gender equality, and
is incredible progress.

stunts economic
Why is such a simple thing like water

so important? Maybe it’s because it development”

is so simple, or maybe a better word

is essential. - Yale 2016 EPI Report

Data reporting and analysis for clean

water is something that fisheries

should take note of and build off of.

Starting in 2000, rigorous, accurate,

and broad data was implemented

across the world for clean water and

sanitation. Something that fish stock

data has in large failed to do so.

There still
improvements to be
made.

There are still issues with water

quality data such as the sources

affected by surrounding

environments.  Another issue is the

data doesn’t account for barriers to

access, such as price and cost. There

has been a big push recently for

ridding of these issues in reporting.

AIR

Half of the worlds

population live in nations

with unsafe air quality

That is 3.5 billion people

More deaths globally occur

due to poor air quality than

water
 AIR It’s a global issue because almost

half of the globe lives in areas with

unsafe air conditions. About 3.5

billion people.

A large chunk of those 3.5 billion

people are from South East Asia and

Air pollution seems to appear as an
the pacific region at about 1.3
isolated, by-country problem. And
billion.
while major health concerns and

extreme potency typically builds from

the source areas, air pollution

50%
impacts the entire world, no matter

the country.

This is a global issue.

live with bad air
Wildfires
quality
Depending on the area, there are Sources of air pollution for

several culprits to reduced air quality developed countries are usually in

and therefore increased risks the form of manufacturing, energy

associated with them. production, and transportation. While

many developed countries have been

Forest fires, also a large cause of implementing great efficiency

deforestation, are a huge cause of standards, cars and trucks are still

air pollution. This could refer to fires emitting toxic particulates into the

caused directly by human mistakes, air we breathe.

indirectly through climate change, or

slash and burn strategies for clearing

Developing countries look a little

different. Their air pollution mostly

forests for farming.
comes from burning organic

materials. This could include forest

fires for farming, heating homes,

cooking, burning waste, and burning

leftover crop material.

Residential burning can be even

more serious since the pollution is so

close to children, elders, and

individuals who are often in close

proximity. 

We grow up learning about

dangerous situations to avoid

harming our bodies. We think of

Fires have the potential to send
extreme things like fires, falling, or
massive amounts of carbon into the
drowning, but few of us think about
air within a matter of weeks, when
the potential for bad air quality to
entire countries wouldn’t even put
cause death, which has even more
out the same amount in a whole
potential to do so than contaminated
year.
water.
FISH

Declining fish stock

show that poor

measurement an

improper management

lead to environmental

harm

1/3 of global fish stock are

over exposed or collapsed

Why does overfishing matter?

Overfishing endangers ocean ecosystems and the

billions of people who rely on seafood as a key

source of protein. Without sustainable

management, our fisheries face collapse — and we

face a food crisis.

 FISH 34% of global fish stocks are

overexposed or have collapsed due

to the mismanagement of

commercial and recreational fishing.

When all natural things are

The word fish is massively
connected, this has a massive impact
encompassing, there are almost
on the oceans and systems which
34,000 species of fish i d e n t i f i e d depend on them.
a n d w i t h o n l y a b o u t 20% o f o u r

oceans explored there are bound to

be many more.

34%
Fish, like every other living being on

this planet, are connected to a food

chain. Remember when I said oceans

were one of the lungs of the world?

overexposed or
When we are affecting Wildfires
have collapsed
the health of fish, we
are also affecting the
health of the oceans. It’s a strange thing to see

conservation all around the world

Not to mention all the land species
being so successful, but when it
and ecosystems which depend on the
comes to oceans the opposite is
oceans, this includes billions of
happening.
people who depend on fish for a

food source.
This is due to several reasons. Some

of them being:

Technology for proper data

collection and analysis is

Oceans are managed on a national
underfunded. This restricts countries
level. Each country has water rights
and international organizations from
200 nautical miles offshore from it’s
properly managing fishing stocks.
coastlines. This means there's not a

lot to be done if a country chooses

to ignore scientists and data.

The more people we
put on this planet, the
more food we need,
and the more food we
need, the more data
and management that
High seas are difficult to manage. will be required.
These are the areas where no

countries have any exclusive rights to

but still possess a massive amount of

fish stocks. It requires international

cooperation since there is no way to

properly enforce these zones...yet.

Data is not provided reliably.

Countries are required to provide

stock data for the species they

catch. However, the data that many

provide is useless due to the lack of

data collected or the incorrect way

they collected it.

WASTEWATER

of the worlds discharged

water is untreated

23% of countries have no

wastewater treatment
 WASTE
WATER Not to mention, when chemicals are

brought into the picture, this has an

instant negative impact on anything

around them.

Wastewater refers to any water that

has been run through a residential or

commercial system, thus polluting its

quality.

When wastewater enters an

ecosystem again, it’s referred to as

80% of the world’s

discharge.

discharged water is untreated .

This is an issue because when we

add foreign particulates to an

ecosystem no matter how “natural”,

Affecting water systems above or
they have an effect on it.
below ground especially has
Wildfires
potential to affect any habitat

connected to that water. Untreated

discharge has a lot of potential to

affect not only natural habitats, but

80%
also the water we drink and food we

eat.

of wastewater is
untreated
Back when we were talking about With23% of countries not having
drinking water and sanitation I wastewater treatment systems in
mentioned how there are still flaws place , t h i s i s t h e p a r t o f w a t e r t h a t
in the data. One of those flaws is the doesn’t shine as bright as drinking

contaminated environment around water does.

clean water and it’s potential to

harm it. 

Untreated wastewater
is one of the major
causes of surrounding
pollution.

23%
of countries do not
have a wastewater
treatment system
 It’s sad, surprising, and interesting that many of the world’s

issues all go back to the essentials. The basics.

Things like drinking water, air, food, transportation, and nature

have already been culprits for multiple major conflicts, deaths,

and health problems.

While these issues may appear simple, we ought to take care of

them in order to have a solid foundation for a healthier and

happier world. 

We may just find when we have finally taken care of the

essentials, the world will feel and look a lot better for

generations to come. 

From us, at LastObject

To you, our amazing community