More than half of the tree species in the Amazon rainforest may be globally threatened with extinction because of environmental threats such as deforestation and forest fires, a large international study has found.

Scientists estimate that up to 8,700 of the 15,000 tree species in the Amazon are under threat as a result of current and projected deforestation across the region.

Other tropical rainforests elsewhere in the world are suffering similar environmental degradation which means that as many as 57 per cent of the more than 40,000 tropical tree species on earth could now be threatened with extinction under the Red List criteria of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the researchers have concluded.

“Forests in the Amazon have been declining since the 1950s, but there was a poor understanding of how this has affected populations of individual species. Our research estimates that more than half of all species may face extinction,” said Professor Carlos Peres of the University of East Anglia in Norwich, who was part of the study published in the journal Science Advances.

“Fortunately protected areas and indigenous territories now cover over half of the Amazon basin, and likely contain sizable populations of most threatened species,” Professor Peres said.

“But parks and reserves will only prevent extinction of threatened species if they suffer no further degradation. Amazonian forests and reserves still face a barrage of threats – from dam construction and mining to wildfires and droughts intensified by global warming,” he said.