The Yucatán Peninsula has experienced a significant loss of forest land from 2019 to 2023, with a total of 285,580 hectares disappearing. This equates to an average daily loss of 196 hectares, reducing the total forest and jungle area from 9.9 million hectares to 9.6 million. This data comes from an assessment by the Mexican Civil Council for Sustainable Forestry (CCMSS).

The annual deforestation rate in this region is notably higher than the national average. Across Mexico, the rate is 0.1 percent, but in the Yucatán Peninsula, it is four times higher at 0.4 percent. This marks the highest rate of loss in recent decades for the region, as reported in the Evaluation of Deforestation in the Yucatán Peninsula from 2019 to 2023.

The report details that among the three states that comprise the peninsula, Campeche has suffered the most deforestation in the period analyzed, with an average annual loss of 29,281 hectares. Yucatán follows with 27,519 hectares, and Quintana Roo with 14,595 hectares.

Since 2010, forest cover loss in the Yucatán Peninsula has surged, with the most significant deforestation occurring in the municipalities of Hopelchén and Candelaria in Campeche; Bacalar, Othón P. Blanco, and Benito Juárez in Quintana Roo; and in municipalities near the city of Mérida, Yucatán. Despite Quintana Roo having some of the most extensive jungles in the country, it lost an average of 33 hectares per day in 2018 alone.

The CCMSS's Information System of Changes of Forest Cover (Sicamfor) platform allows the public to visualize changes in forest cover at state, municipal, and communal levels from 2016 to 2023. The council reported an average annual loss of 71,395 hectares from 2019 to 2023.

The Yucatán Peninsula, along with the forest territories of Chiapas, Belize, and Guatemala, constitutes the largest continuous extension of tropical forest in America after the Amazon. The peninsula is home to 54 percent of the country's mangroves and several unique ecosystems, including petenes, cenotes, and an extensive flooded cave system. The area also houses four aquifers that provide 25 percent of the country's total water and 11 indigenous communities.

Despite the global significance of this region, the Yucatán Peninsula is undergoing a process of degradation and deforestation that threatens ecosystems, species, and human livelihoods. Major contributors to deforestation include extractive industries such as agribusiness, extensive livestock, large-scale pig and poultry farms, the expansion of the tourism and real estate industry, renewable energy generation parks, and large infrastructure projects like the Maya Train.

The council also highlights the weakening of the country's environmental institutions due to drastic budget cuts and the dismantling of their structures as a significant concern.