Firstly, there is a clear distinction between deforestation and logging. Deforestation is the removal of forests in their entirety and their corresponding marine and territorial species together with the associated plant life. Logging is related to the commercial practice of cutting trees for the purpose of producing other finished products such as paper, furniture etc.
According to the WWF (World Wildlife Fund) nearly 50% of the global forests are at high risk of deforestation by 2030. This is not due to legal logging but due to the expansion of illegal agricultural activity that often involves the destruction by burning of huge acres of forest for illegal farming and logging purposes. The extend of this destruction is evident in the Amazon rain forest and in places such as Borneo where the destruction was so extensive that the smoke caused significant air pollution in places like Singapore and Malaysia. Illegal logging has also had a negative effect on legal timber economies which several countries depend on. The losses to the legal logging industry are significant, depriving the industry of between $10 to $15 billion dollars per year.
Revenue generated for illegal logging has, according to Greenpeace, has been used to fund other criminal activities. Additionally, the availability of cheap timber from illegal logging has also driven many legal timber companies out of business, leaving a vacuum for illegal logging to thrive.
Other links:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/deforestation
https://thehumaneleague.org/article/effects-of-deforestation
