Why should I get involved with nature in Canada and/or Peru?
The preservation of the world lies in the wilderness. By this we mean that by preserving the wilderness, we preserve our own basis of life. Here are the details:
Unique and species-rich nature
The tropical rainforest of the Madre de Dios region is a unique ecosystem, its primeval forests are home to the greatest biodiversity in the world. Mysterious jaguars and playful monkeys are just as much at home here as clumsy tapirs and liana-covered giant trees. There are ten times more reptiles and amphibians here than in Germany, approximately 10% of all bird species in the world can be observed here, and more tree species can be found on one hectare of forest than in the whole of Europe, to name just a few examples. In addition, there are endemic animal and plant species that have adapted so strongly to the local ecosystem that they can only survive there. To date, 477 bird species, 162 amphibian and reptile species, and 92 mammal species (including 48 large mammal species and 44 bat species) have been recorded in the Secret Forest in Peru. By comparison, only 21 amphibian species, 15 reptile species, and 25 bat species live in Germany.
The temperate rainforest in Canada is no less spectacular. These primeval forests are also home to a unique biodiversity, giant trees that are thousands of years old, and beautiful raised bogs, whose underground biomass stores up to three times as much carbon as the forests of British Columbia. Rare ghost flowers are at home here, as are bears, wolves, and eagles. The older forests become, the greater their genetic diversity and the better the reproductive capacity of their inhabitants. Thus, primeval forests guarantee the survival of countless species and are essential for the preservation of biodiversity (Gibson et al., 2011). Only if existing, intact ecosystems are preserved can rare or endangered species spread from there again.
This is an essential prerequisite for the restoration and rehabilitation of damaged forests, land, and soil—especially those affected by desertification, drought, and flooding. Some functional groups, such as fungi, lichens, and beetles, take up to 180 years to recover after their habitat has been cleared, but they never return to pre-destruction levels. These slow recovery rates of some functional groups that are essential to the functioning of the ecosystem make primary forests an irreplaceable resource for biodiversity (Spake et al., 2015). Germany, too, was once covered with primeval forests of ancient trees. The fact that nothing remains of them today shows that wilderness cannot be taken for granted. It is our responsibility to protect the remaining wilderness areas, wherever they may be.
Climate Conservation
The rainforest plays a major role in the greenhouse effect, the warming of the atmosphere, in several ways. First, large amounts of CO₂ are bound in the biomass of the rainforest – the temperate rainforests of western Canada are the global leaders in this respect. Nowhere else do trees and forest bogs bind so much CO₂ – over 60 kg per square meter in the Misty Forest! In addition, trees with a large diameter have stored extremely large amounts of carbon (Mildrexler et al., 2020). If the forest is cleared or destroyed by fire, huge amounts of CO2 are released. Estimates suggest that around 10 to 15% of annual CO2 emissions are attributable to slash-and-burn practices (Wille, 2018). By protecting these forests, we ensure that the carbon remains bound and does not return to the atmosphere as CO₂, where it would accelerate global warming. Greenhouse gases are distributed evenly in the atmosphere, so it is irrelevant where emissions are caused or saved. What is crucial is that the global concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is reduced.
Rainforests are also extremely important for the climate because they balance temperature differences and regulate global rainfall distribution. Without the cooling and water storage functions of rainforests, important precipitation would be lost, leading to increasingly hotter and drier conditions. In addition, forests produce vital oxygen and filter the air.
The protection of Peruvian and Canadian rainforests thus makes a tangible contribution to climate stabilization. You can find out more about this here.
Acute threat
The scientific community describes the effects of rainforest destruction as the greatest natural disaster since the last ice age. 2024 was a sad record year for forest loss. In one year, tropical forests covering a record 6.7 million hectares were lost, an area equivalent to the entire size of Panama (WRI, 2025). Most of this destruction was caused by human-induced fires, which are often used to clear land for cattle grazing or agriculture. The ongoing loss of forest is having a catastrophic impact on biodiversity. The extinction of a single plant species is often linked to the extinction of another 10 to 30 animal and plant species, as most organisms in the rainforest are interdependent (Siebert, 2011). Millions of species have thus disappeared along with the forest in recent decades.
But while almost everyone is aware of the threat to and value of the Amazon rainforests, hardly anyone talks about Canada's forgotten ecosystem: British Columbia (BC) is home to the world's last large contiguous area of temperate rainforest (DellaSala, 2010). There is still virgin forest there. And yet, unfortunately, the timber industry is one of Canada's most important economic sectors, and BC, of all places, is one of the last jurisdictions on earth that continues to allow the large-scale deforestation of 600-1800-year-old virgin forest giants (Wu, 2019). Between 2003 and 2010, deforestation in BC alone was responsible for annual CO₂ emissions of 49.5 megatons (Wieting, 2015), more than the whole of Finland. Only about 25% of the original temperate rainforest area remains in Canada. In addition to the threat posed by the timber industry, these last remaining areas are also threatened by the creation of new agricultural land, urban sprawl, the construction of new infrastructure, and Canada's withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol.
Saying thank you to nature
The natural balance is only maintained if we no longer just take, but also give. Therefore, it is time to finally give back to nature. Let's say thank you for everything nature provides us with - let's protect nature together.