Goodbye, Wilderness

That's what some scientists think will happen unless we change our ways. The study team mapped wilderness areas around the globe, which were defined as "biologically and ecologically intact landscapes free of any significant human disturbance", and then compared that to one produced by the same methods in the early 1990s. The result? Rapid development had wiped out roughly 10 percent of wilderness over the past 20 years. 

The study reported total losses of 3.3 million km² since the 1990s, particularly in South America, which experienced 29.6 percent loss, and Africa, with 14 percent. The world currently has a total of 30.1 million km² of remaining wilderness, which is primarily located in North America, North Asia, North Africa, and Australia.