Many environmentalists think so.--though the radical environmentalists would never admit this could be true.
There are a number of reason to support this position.
1) There are more "new growth" forests and fewer "old growth" forests. Anyone with common sense knows that you can support a LOT more smaller trees on the same area of land (with the same water supply available) than you could with much larger trees. In fact, larger trees can make so much shade that it is almost impossible for any other plants to grow beneath them. Smaller trees don't do this to nearly the same extent. Because of this, new growth forests allow seedling trees to exist close to existing trees while old growth forests do not.
2) Today, most developed countries have an increasing area of forest land, undeveloped countries have decreasing area of forest land. While decreasing forest land area slightly outweighs increasing forest land area, when reason #1 is taken into account, more trees today would still be true.
3) Barren areas, like deserts, that are then colonized by cities have trees planted where none existed prior. Another reason for more trees in developed countries.
4) Undeveloped countries use wood for fuel, developed countries do not.
5) Improved fire fighting techniques and technology have prevented fires from burning as much area as they used to, before these techniques existed. Unfortunately, the much higher fuel available, per acre, to these fires today (too many trees and brush) makes today's fires far more intense than they used to be, because we have been too successful in increasing the tree numbers. This, in turn, is beginning to make fires harder to fight so now the area these fires consume is increasing. (But the damage from these fires hasn't made up for the increase in trees -- yet.)
www.strike-the-root.com/4/langr/langr2.html
Check out greenspirit.com (founded by the original founder of greenpeace, after he decided to leave greenpeace when it was taken over by lawyers and environmental fraud artists/extremists).
Notice how I start a new thread when posting about a new subject, unlike some hypocrites here who radically change the subject within a thread and then accuse me of doing so.
Rodney
