Those lost acres in Bolivia are part of threatened and globally important ecosystems, including the Amazon rainforest and the Chiquitano dry forests. They are rich not only in wildlife \u2014 including the elusive maned wolf<\/a>, a long-legged canine that is actually not a wolf \u2014 but also in carbon. After trees are cleared, much of the carbon they store returns quickly to the atmosphere, accelerating climate change. (Not-so-fun fact: Yearly carbon emissions from deforestation in the tropics are greater than<\/a> the output from the entire European Union.)<\/p>\n On the surface, the story of deforestation in Bolivia mirrors that of other tropical countries: People are knocking down trees there to make way for cattle ranches and farms, the two leading drivers of tropical forest loss. Often, people clear land with fire. And as climate change makes droughts more severe in places like Bolivia<\/a>, those fires more easily spread out of control and into areas that weren\u2019t meant to burn, taking out even larger stretches of primary forest.<\/p>\n But when you look more closely at who, exactly, is fueling much of the recent deforestation, Bolivia starts to stand out \u2014 thanks to an unexpected player.<\/p>\n A brown-throated sloth on a tree in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Insights\/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)<\/p>\n The white religious sect cutting down Bolivia\u2019s trees<\/p>\n The main reason people clear forests in Bolivia is to make way for cattle. It\u2019s typically cheaper to buy forested land and remove the trees than to acquire existing pasture, says Daniel Larrea, science and technology program director at Conservaci\u00f3n Amaz\u00f3nica, a Bolivian NGO. Plus, under the country\u2019s legal system, landowners risk losing their land in Bolivia if they don\u2019t demonstrate that they\u2019re using it \u201cproductively,\u201d such as by raising cattle for beef, effectively creating an incentive for deforestation.<\/p>\n The other major source of forest loss in Bolivia is the rapid expansion of soy farms, the nation\u2019s top export crop, by weight<\/a>. Between 2001 and 2021, soy farms in Bolivia \u2014 which feed global demand for animal feed and soybean oil \u2014 destroyed some 2.2 million acres of forests, according to a 2023 report<\/a> by the nonprofit Amazon Conservation Association (affiliated with Conservaci\u00f3n Amaz\u00f3nica). That\u2019s roughly the size of Puerto Rico.<\/p>\n Soy farming is among the leading causes of deforestation across the tropics, in places like Brazil, Argentina, and parts of Africa. What makes it more unusual in Bolivia is the people behind much of its production and related environmental harm: Mennonites.<\/p>\n A mostly white Christian group, Mennonites \u2014 who have similar origins to the Amish \u2014 started migrating to Latin America<\/a> from Canada in the early 1900s. They first settled in Mexico and Paraguay and then later expanded into a number of other South American countries, including Peru and Bolivia, in the mid-20th century. Bolivia is now home to the largest and fastest-growing community of Mennonites in Latin America, says Yann le Polain de Waroux, a geographer at McGill University, who has studied Mennonites.<\/p>\n As they spread across Latin America, Mennonites typically made a living by farming, which they\u2019ve done for centuries. And in Bolivia, one of the main crops they grew \u2014 and still grow \u2014 is soy. In fact, Mennonites were among the first groups to introduce<\/a> commercial soy farming to Bolivia, helping turn the country into a top-10 soy producer globally, according to Susanna Hecht, a researcher at the University of California Los Angeles. While Mennonite colonies often eschew modern household technologies, like smartphones and TVs, their farms typically use the same machinery as any modern farm, including large tractors and herbicide-tolerant seeds, Hecht told Vox.<\/p>\n In the last few decades, Mennonites have produced between about 20 percent and 40 percent of Bolivia\u2019s soy, according to different studies<\/a> and reports<\/a>. And much of that production came at the expense of Bolivia\u2019s tropical and dry forests, which stood in the places where fields of soy now grow. Researchers estimate<\/a> that Mennonites caused nearly a quarter of the soy-related deforestation in Bolivia over the last two decades \u2014 and that share has risen<\/a> in more recent years, according to Amazon Conservation Association\u2019s Monitoring of the Andes Amazon Program.<\/p>\n To be clear, it\u2019s not that Mennonites operate their farms in an especially destructive way; you can\u2019t farm soy in forest habitats without first clearing trees. Blame for surging deforestation more fairly lies on the government \u2014 which has, over the years, made expanding agricultural production a state policy and allowed people to clear forests without penalty. Mennonites have, for example, \u201cbeen able to capitalize on government incentives through the duty-free import of heavy machinery for mechanized agriculture,\u201d Larrea said.<\/p>\n Food companies and consumers also play a large role in driving this deforestation: Demand for soybeans has skyrocketed<\/a> in the last few decades, in step with a rise in the demand for meat and the soy-based livestock feed \u2014 yet another reminder that meat production destroys tropical forests.<\/p>\n One 2023 report<\/a> by the advocacy group Global Witness linked Cargill \u2014 the largest<\/a> private company in the US, which sells animal feed, beef, and a wide range of other food and pharmaceutical products \u2014 to soy grown by Mennonites on land that was recently deforested. (Cargill told Vox that it did not find evidence that the soy it sourced from Bolivia, referenced in the Global Witness report, came from areas that were recently deforested.)<\/p>\n Is there an alternative path for Bolivia? <\/p>\n Slowing deforestation globally remains one of the most challenging and complex environmental problems of our time. In each year of the last two decades, millions of acres of tropical forest \u2014 among the world\u2019s most important regions for biodiversity and carbon sequestration \u2014 have vanished. Though global deforestation dipped in 2025, it still consumed 10.6 million acres, according to WRI\u2019s analysis, equivalent to more than 11 soccer fields per minute.<\/p>\n If there\u2019s one way to distill the problem, it\u2019s that forests today are not as valuable standing as they are cut down. Absent strong markets for carbon and biodiversity<\/a> \u2014 which can make intact trees more valuable \u2014 well-enforced government regulations are among the only measures that work to cut deforestation rates.<\/p>\n And that brings us to a rare bit of good news: Last year, Brazil \u2014 which contains about 60 percent of the Amazon rainforest \u2014 saw a 42 percent drop in forest loss compared to 2024, according to WRI\u2019s recent analysis. That drop is part of a larger trend over the past few years of declining deforestation in Brazil, the analysis shows.<\/p>\n WRI researchers attribute Brazil\u2019s success to stronger environmental policies and enforcement that were put in place by President Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva (\u201cLula\u201d). Lula stepped into power in 2023, following the rule of Jair Bolsonaro, who showed wanton disregard for environmental laws and oversaw a spike in deforestation<\/a> during his tenure. Lula, for example, relaunched a comprehensive anti-deforestation framework \u2014 known as the Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Deforestation in the Legal Amazon \u2014 that includes establishing new parks and bulking up environmental enforcement, among other measures<\/a>.<\/p>\n A farmer sprays pesticides on a field of soybeans in eastern Bolivia. Diego Giudice\/Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/p>\n WRI similarly links a recent deforestation slump in a few other countries, including Colombia and Malaysia, to stronger environmental policies. Early last year, for example, the government of Colombia put in place a regulation<\/a> that grants rural communities the rights to use forests on the condition that they keep them standing.<\/p>\n These positive outcomes for forests hold important lessons for curbing deforestation in Bolivia. They show that attaining such a goal is possible. And that good governance works. \u201cA shift in the country\u2019s development vision is necessary,\u201d Larrea said of Bolivia \u2014 \u201ca vision based on the sustainable use of the forest, not its destruction.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-590647275.jpg\"\/)
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