Analysis of food system drivers of deforestation highlights foreign direct investments and urbanization as threats to tropical forests

Abstract

Approximately 90% of global forest cover changes between 2000 and 2018 were attributable to agricultural expansion, making food production the leading direct driver of deforestation. While previous studies have focused on the interaction between human and environmental systems, limited research has explored deforestation from a food system perspective. This study analyzes the drivers of deforestation in 40 tropical and subtropical countries (2004-2021) through the lenses of consumption/demand, production/supply and trade/distribution using Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) models. Our models explained a substantial portion of deforestation variability globally (R² = 0.74) and in Asia (R² = 0.81) and Latin America (R² = 0.73). The results indicate that trade- and demand-side dynamics, specifically foreign direct investments and urban population growth, play key roles in influencing deforestation trends at these scales, suggesting that food system-based interventions could be effective in mitigating deforestation. Conversely, the model for Africa showed weaker explanatory power (R² = 0.30), suggesting that factors beyond the food system may play a larger role in this region. Our findings highlight the importance of targeting trade- and demand-side dynamics to reduce deforestation and how interventions within the food system could synergistically contribute to achieving sustainable development goals, such as climate action, life on land and zero hunger.

Figure 1

Mean and standard deviation of driver variables for each region. Consists of data for 40 countries for the period 2004–2021. Tree cover loss data are sourced from the Terra-i monitoring system. The elevation variable is a measure of the median elevation of pixels where tree cover loss was identified by Terra-i. ‘Foreign invest’ corresponds to cross-sectoral foreign direct investments. The travel time variable represents the average travel time from pixels where tree cover loss was identified to population centers with > 5000 inhabitants.

Figure 2

Relative importance of variables in explaining tree cover loss across scales. Consumption–demand factors include food inflation, GDP growth, population growth and percentage of rural population. Production–supply factors include GDP per capita, elevation (measure of median elevation of pixels where tree cover loss was identified), temperature change and travel time (average travel time from tree cover loss pixels to population centers with > 5000 people). Trade–distribution factors include GDP exports (% of GDP from exports), food exports, food imports and cross-sectoral foreign direct investments.