Using forests wisely
If people are to continue to benefit from forests, they must use them sensibly. WWF is involved in projects all over the world which aim to help people use forests wisely, and overcome the many factors that currently discourage them from doing so.
Many forested countries in the tropics are deeply in debt and have large, hungry populations. External pressure to pay off these debts quickly has forced a lot of countries to exploit every natural resource available. Unequal distribution of wealth and power within countries further complicates the situation.
One way to reduce these pressures is for international trade organizations to acknowledge the importance of sustainable harvesting. At the moment, people who have adopted sustainable forest management can lose out because they produce less timber. It is therefore important for trade systems to be altered to distinguish between sustainably and unsustainably produced timber, and to favour the former. The International Tropical Timber Organization recognizes this, and aims to have the entire tropical timber trade based on timber from sustainably managed forests by the year 2000.
However, it is very difficult for people to find out under what conditions timber has been produced. A new international organization, the Forest Stewardship Council, is being formed to encourage producers and traders to have timber independently labelled with reliable information about how it has been produced. This will enable purchasers to favour sustainably produced timber.
Meanwhile, consumers can help make the timber trade sustainable by asking retailers how items have been produced. In countries such as the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, demand for sustainably produced timber is already forcing retailers to make efforts to stock it.
Consumers can also help conserve forests by thinking harder about the things they buy. There is a big difference between buying an oak table that will last for hundreds of years, and buying one made from chipboard or plywood that will need to be replaced within a decade. The oak table will cost more now, but in the long term the investment will save both money and forests.
WWF works alongside a variety of other organizations, supporting schemes to help people harvest timber and other forest products sustainably, process them locally, and market them advantageously.
In Mexico, under the "Plan Piloto Forestal", local people harvest, process, and market timber through a cooperative. An innovative harvesting technique permits vegetation to grow back naturally as it does after trees fall down of their own accord. The timber is cut into commercially desirable widths and lengths by the cooperative' s sawmill.
The Coed Cymru project in Wales offers free forestry advice and training, and promotes trade in British hardwoods (broadleaved deciduous trees like oak and ash) from well - managed forests, thereby providing local jobs. The long-term goal: to revitalize 30,000 hectares of woodland.
Brazil' s forests contain a number of marketable products. Most of the income generated by these products currently goes to middlemen. A new cooperative boosts local profits by purchasing and marketing rubber and Brazil nuts on behalf of 500 families. Cultural Survival (an international non - governmental organization) acts as a non-profit making broker, buying nuts directly from the cooperative and selling them to manufacturers in the US, thereby quadrupling the nut gatherers income.
In northern Pakistan, tribal leaders are developing a scheme to harvest and sell chilgoza nuts and oil. Recognizing the advantages of harvesting rapidly renewed resources - i.e. nuts and oil - rather than those that replace themselves slowly - such as timber - local people are re-evaluating their forests and adjusting the ways they use them.
Agroforestry is a traditional practice that allows people to enjoy the benefits of natural forests, rear livestock, and cultivate crops at the same time.
In the small eastern Amazonian farming community of Araras, 120 families are experimenting with cultivating and selling a range of indigenous tree crops. Citrus fruits, black pepper, mahogany, avocado, and cupuau are grown in nurseries, planted out in the forest, and cared for and harvested by the community.
Another way of benefiting from forests without harming them is through carefully controlled tourism. In Zaire' s Virunga National Park, whose lowland tropical forests are home to some of the world' s last remaining mountain gorillas, small groups of tourists pay to stay in simple cabins and go on guided gorilla - watching expeditions.
Deforestation can also be reduced by controlling the amount of wood cut for fuel. Throughout the world, millions of people burn wood to cook food and heat their homes. By encouraging them to use fuel - efficient stoves, which burn far less wood than open fires or traditional stoves, it is possible both to relieve the pressure on forests and make life easier for fuel collectors.
But perhaps the most important way to encourage people to use forests wisely is to make sure that they understand how important forests are, and to help them assess the way they use forest products. Journalists, film - makers, writers, and teachers all play a key role in raising people' s awareness of the value of forests and the dangers of deforestation.
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