Deforestation

Deforestation is the cutting down of trees in forested areas. Trees are cut down for wood, used to make papers, building materials etc. Forests are also deforested so that there is more space available for human activities like mining, grazing of animals, planting of crops, construction of infrastructure and for many other purposes.
Trees absorb carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, to produce oxygen during photosynthesis in the trees. The trees absorb a significant amount of carbon dioxide, in turn reducing a significant amount of global greenhouse gas emission.
Deforestation cut down trees and plants that photosynthesise. This make there an increase in the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Soil contains one of the most amount of carbons in the world. The decay of organic accumulates carbon in the soil. The trees in the forest originally block the soil from sunlight; without the trees, the soil is exposed to sunlight. This increases the temperature of the soil which in turn increase the rate of carbon oxidation, a process where carbon oxidise to form carbon dioxide. This is another way how deforestation increase the amount of greenhouse gases.
Deforestation causes the second greatest increase in greenhouse gases.
Between 2000 and 2010, 52000 km² of forest was lost annually; 142.5 km² of forest is lost everyday.
Afforestation is done in many countries to reduce the problem of deforestation.