Avocados: The green gold that wipes western Mexico’s forests from the map

Every 75 seconds, a tree is felled illegally in the mountains of Jalisco to establish avocado plantations in its place. By the end of the day, 1,100 trees will have fallen. At this rate, per year, there will be 401,500 trees and 1,054 ha (2,604 acres, three times the size of Central Park in New York). These are some of the preliminary figures that can be extracted from the study “Analysis of land use change in the agricultural frontier of the state of Jalisco”, soon to be published and prepared by the Ministry of the Environment and Territorial Development (SEMADET), the state agency in charge of, among other things, implementing public policies for the conservation of natural resources.

Source: Avocados: The green gold that wipes western Mexico’s forests from the map