Introduction

The greatest threats to the conservation of great apes and gibbons are forest loss and poaching. These impacts are manifested in a number of ways that include habitat loss, fragmentation and degradation by logging, expanding agriculture and food production for commercial and subsistence purposes, expanding infrastructures, forest fires, expanding mining, and changed land use. Other factors such as expanding human settlements in, or in the vicinity of, ape habitats, growing tourism, increased hunting for bushmeat, the live pet trade, and increased spread of human diseases also contribute to the loss of great ape and gibbon populations. It is the rapidly growing global demand for natural resources including land, water, minerals, energy, food, and forest products that lies at the heart of encroachment into ape habitats and there are a number of different drivers underlying these trends. This chapter focuses on the drivers that influence the expansion of extractive industries into ape habitats, highlighting various megatrends.

By focusing on megatrends, which are major societal and transformative forces, this chapter initially presents detail on the following global drivers: economic development, demographics, globalization, and infrastructure. The impacts of these drivers on minerals and mining, biodiversity, and industrial logging are further explored as these three factors are considered most relevant to presenting the linkages between global processes, extractive industries, and the status and welfare of apes.