Colombia lost 159,000 hectares of forest

Colombia lost 159,000 hectares of forest -- an area the size of Brazilian megacity Sao Paulo -- to deforestation in 2019, according to an official report presented on Thursday. Although considerable, it represents a 19 percent reduction in deforestation compared to the 197,000 hectares destroyed in 2018. In 2017, that figure was 219,000. Some 62 percent of the deforestation was in the Amazon, the world's largest rainforest that spans across Colombia, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela.