While the formidable ‘forbidden forest’ at Hogwarts, with its scary creatures lurking may be be safe from being cut down and turned into photocopying paper, most muggle tree’s around the world however don’t have such a bright future… thank goodness JK Rowling is on board to help!

The world famous and incredibly talented author JK Rowling, writer of the adored wizarding Harry Potter series, has a big soft spot for ancient tree’s and is actively battling against deforestation as we speak.

On top of her many other charitable causes she backs or has selflessly created – at least thirteen fantastic causes – it is amazing she even has time to campaign for trees.

But when the driving forces behind the multi awarding winning novelist, Nicole Rycroft, approached her about protecting Canada’s ancient trees from the escalating hungry demand for wood to turn into throw away paper products, Joanne was keen to jump onboard and promote the use of environmentally friendly paper.

In a desperate bid to open the worlds eyes about the growing destruction we are causing to the trees and wildlife that inhabits it, Rycroft said, “Knowing that 800-year-old trees were disappearing into Jackie Collins novels or photocopy paper, it seems ludicrous to me. If you’ve been to a clear cut, it feels like you’ve been to the moon. It really feels like an act of violence.”

With Rowling long ago becoming the worlds best selling author of all time, with her seven amazing books totaling 4,195 pages of pure adventure and having sold at least 450 million copies in 65 languages and counting, JK Rowling is the biggest celeb to have on board such a great charity.

Saving million of trees being cut down to satisfy just the need of her book publication, JK Rowling has single handedly saved the lives of many trees and wild life, but together with Nicole Rycroft  and her dedicated team they have managed to change the way the publishing world works.

Her participation of nearly a decade has helped to transform the supply chance and lead to over 700 of the world’s largest paper purchasers vowing to protect ancient forests in Canada as well as certifying where their pulp comes from.

The noble JK Rowling released this moving statement about the crucial importants of saving our trees:

“The forest at Hogwarts is home to magical creatures like unicorns and centaurs. Because the Canadian editions are printed on Ancient Forest Friendly paper, the Harry Potter books are helping to save magnificent forests in the Muggle world, home of magical animals such as orangutans, wolves and bears. It is a good idea to respect ancient trees, especially if they have a temper like the Whomping Willow.”

Now you may have noticed that this article is largely referring to the protecting the Canadian forests, but if you hop off now and grab your copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, look inside and you shall see the mark of the Forest Stewardship Council. That is a global charity that has expanded to support ‘responsible forest management worldwide’. Go JK!

Although JK Rowling, Nicole Rycroft and her team have done a tremendous amount of work to protect these amazing ancient forests, sadly there are still countless places in the world that have failed to listen to their words of wisdom.

Every ‘second’ 1.5 acres of forest are lost (equivalent to 1.5 football pitches). So that is a staggering 129,600 football pitches of forests lost every single ‘day’ and a colossal 47,304,000 acres a year.

With these heart wrenching statistics it is no wonder environmental experts predict that the worlds forest could completely disappear in less than 30 years, and it is not just the trees in danger of being whipped off the face of the earth…

It has also been estimated that we are losing 137 plants, animal and insect species every single day due to deforestation. That equates to 50,000 species a year. As these species disappear not only is that murdering lives but it also prevents using the natural ingredients to develop possible cures for life-threatening diseases.

You can now see, that despite the incredibly work charities are doing, we are still a long way off saving the planet…

So next time you go to trash a newspaper or paper cup, think twice and recycle – every little helps!