【正文】 s in the catchment lakes along its course…are plummeting. Lake Powell took 17 years to reach highwater mark. Its level is now half of that. Water shortages could affect nearly two billion people…before 2050. Yet water is still abundant in unspoiled regions of the planet. The wetlands.These wetlands are crucial to all life on Earth. They represent six percent of the Planet. Marshes are sponges that regulate the flow of water. They absorb it in the wet season and release it in the dry season. The water runs off the mountain peaks, carrying with it the seeds of the regions it flows through. This process gives birth to unique landscapes, where the diversity of species is unequaled in its richness. Under the calm water lies a veritable factory where this ultimately linked richness and diversity, patiently filters the water and digests all the pollution. Marshes are indispensable environments for the regeneration and purification of water. These wetlands were always seen as unhealthy expanses, unfit for human habitation. In our race to conquer more land, we have reclaimed them as pasture for our livestock, or as land for agriculture or building. In the last century, half of the world’s marshes were drained. We know neither their richness nor their role.All living matter is linked. Water, air, soil, trees. The world’s magic is right in front of our eyes. Trees breathe groundwater into the atmosphere as light mist. They form a canopy that alleviates the impact of heavy rains and protects the soil from erosion. The forests provide the humidity that is necessary for life. They are the mother and father of rain. The forests store carbon. They contain more than all the Earth’s atmosphere. They are the cornerstone of the climatic balance on which we all depend. Trees provide a habitat for threequarters of the planet’s biodiversity—that is to say, of all life on Earth. Every year, we discover new species we had no idea existed—insects, birds, mammals. These forests provide the remedies that cure us. The substances secreted by these plants can be recognized by our bodies. Our cells talk the same language. We are of the same family. Mangroves are forests that step out onto the sea. Like coral reefs, they are a nursery for the oceans. Their roots entwine and form a shelter for the fish and mollusks that e to breed. Mangroves protect the coasts from hurricanes, tidal waves and erosion by the sea. Whole peoples depend on them. Yet, they were reduced by half during the 20th century. One of the reasons for the ongoing disaster is these shrimp farms installed on the mangroves’ rich waters. Ventilators aerate pools full of antibiotics to prevent the asphyxiation of the shrimps, not that of the mangroves.Since the 1960s, deforestation has constantly gathered pace. Every year, 13 million hectares of tropical forest an area the size of Illinois—disappear in smoke and as lumber. The world’s largest rain forest, the Amazon, has already been reduced by 20%. The forest gives way to cattle ranches or soybean farms. Ninetyfive percent of these soybeans are used to feed livestock and poultry in Europe and Asia. And so, a forest is turned into meat. When they burn, forests and their soils release huge quantities of carbon, accounting for 20% of the greenhouse gases emitted across the globe. Deforestation is one of the principal causes of global warming. Thousands of species disappear forever. With them, one of the links in a long chain of evolution snaps. The intelligence of the living matter from which they came is lost forever.Barely 20 years ago, Borneo, the fourthlargest island in the world, was covered by a vast primary forest. At the current rate of deforestation, it will have totally disappeared within 10 years. Living matter bonds water, air, earth and the sun. In Borneo, this bond has been broken in what was one of the Earth’s greatest reservoirs of biodiversity. This catastrophe was provoked by the decision to produce palm oil, the most consumed oil in the world, on Borneo. Palm oil not only caters to our growing demand for food, but also cosmetics, detergents and, increasingly, alternative fuels. The forest diversity was replaced by a single species—the oil palm. Monoculture is easy, productive and rapid. For local people, it provides employment. It is an agriculture industry. Another example of massive deforestation is the eucalyptus. Eucalyptus is used to make paper pulp. Plantations are growing, as demand for paper has increased fivefold in 50 years. Monoculture of trees are gaining ground all over the world. But a monoculture is not a forest. By definition, there is little diversity. One forest does not replace another forest. At the foot of these eucalyptus trees, nothing grows, because their leaves form a bed that is toxic for most other plants. They grow quickly, but exhaust water reserves.Soybeans, palm oil, eucalyptus trees—Deforestation destroys the essential to produce the superfluous. But elsewhere, deforestation is a last resort to survive.Over two billion people—almost a third of the world’s population still depend on charcoal.In Haiti, one of the world’s poorest countries, charcoal is one of the population’s main consumables. Once the pearl of the Caribbean, Haiti can no longer feed its population without foreign aid. On the hills of Haiti, only two percent of the forests are left. Stripped bare, the soil no longer absorbs the rainwater. With no vegetation and no roots to reinforce them, nothing holds the soils back. The rainwater washes them down the hillsides as far as the sea. Erosion impoverishes the quality of the soils, reducing their suitability for agriculture.In some parts of Madagascar, the erosion is spectacular. Whole hillsides bear deep gashes hundreds of meters wide. Thin and fragile, soil is made by living matter. With erosion, the fine layer of humans, which took thousands of years to form, disappears.Here’s one theory of the s