Search Results

Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
  • Journal Article
    Wildlife Conservation in Bornean Timber Concessions
    (2006) Meijaard, Erik; Sheil, Douglas; Nasi, Robert; Stanley, Scott A.
    "Based on an extensive review of the literature, and broad consultation with experts, we have assessed the sensitivity of Bornean vertebrates to the direct and indirect effects of timber harvest. Well-implemented selective logging has a relatively limited direct impact on wildlife populations: few species appear quite sensitive, some benefit, some decline. However, current management practices in Indonesian Borneo generally cause a decline in wildlife populations. Guidelines for sustainable forest management are primarily focused on trees, with few specific recommendations on how to sustainably manage wildlife populations in timber concessions. Based on our findings, we provide extensive wildlife management guidelines, pointing out the importance of maintaining understory vegetation and large trees for fruit, seed, dead wood, and tree hollow production, limiting canopy gaps, and reducing hunting and wildlife trade in concessions. In addition, we provide specific management advice on high priority species of Bornean vertebrates."
  • Journal Article
    Ecological Criteria and Indicators for Tropical Forest Landscapes: Challenges in the Search for Progress
    (2004) Sheil, Douglas; Nasi, Robert; Johnson, Brook
    "In the quest for global standards, 'Criteria and Indicators' (C&I) are among the foremost mechanisms for defining and promoting sustainable tropical forest management. Here we examine some challenges posed by this approach, focusing on examples that reflect the ecological aspects of tropical forests at a management-unit level and assessments such as those required in timber certification. "C&I can foster better forest management. However, there are confusions and tensions to reconcile between general and local applications, between the ideal and the pragmatic, and between the scientific and the democratic. To overcome this requires a sober appraisal of what can realistically be achieved in each location and how this can best be promoted. Good judgment remains the foundation of competent management. Data can inform this judgment, but an over-reliance on data collection and top-down bureaucratic interventions can add to problems rather than solving them. "Our arguments stress compromise, planning, guided implementation, and threat preparedness. Importance is also placed on skills and institutions: the building blocks of effective forest management. We suggest some options for improving forest management. Although a wider discussion of these issues is necessary, procrastination is harmful. Action is needed."
  • Journal Article
    The Multiple Dimensions of Rural Forests: Lessons from a Comparative Analysis
    (2013) Genin, Didier; Aumeeruddy-Thomas, Yildiz; Balent, Gérard; Nasi, Robert
    "Rural forests are characterized by different levels of formal and nonformal appropriation by rural communities who have generally managed, shaped, or rebuilt these forest formations over many generations with refined local knowledge and practices related to their use and perpetuation. Rural forests are therefore social-ecological systems that contribute to ecosystem and landscapes configuration, definition of rural territories, and sustainability of local livelihoods. Although some studies have attempted to explain their specificities, in specific geographical and social contexts, their characteristics are not well defined as they encompass highly diversified situations. This lack of comprehension of the identity of rural forests is at the heart of the lack of dialogue between forestry policies and rural forest development. Our major aim is to identify universal characteristics of rural forests as well as specificities that can differentiate them. Eleven situations of rural forests were analyzed by means of detailed, harmonized monographs, from developing and developed countries, and localized within contrasting ecological environments (humid tropics, dry forests, temperate forests) and socio-economic and public policies contexts. Qualitative data were obtained through a common analytical framework and were encoded with an approach based on the collective appreciation of the group of researchers who developed case studies. These were pooled within a common analysis chart and were processed by means of multivariate analyses. Results were further discussed taking into consideration four major characteristics that emerged from this analysis, and which form the identity of rural forests. These are: 1) specific forest structures and levels of integration in agricultural matrices which are linked historically to overall agroecosystem approaches and practices, 2) a multiscale approach to domestication practices from landscape to individual trees inscribed in continuities between 'nature' and 'culture', natural processes and human techniques of control and transformation, 3) multiple uses of plant species which vary in relation to the commercial or noncommercial status of their products and a reversible nature of these use patterns accordingly, 4) the imbricate nature of rules of access and control between state and customary levels, and between individual and collective levels, requiring specific formal and informal arrangements. Typologies of rural forests can be drawn along each of these major characteristics and provide a reliable system to analyze and understand the functioning of rural forests. Forestry approaches in rural contexts, hence, need to consider variations along these major lines that form the identity cards of rural forests."
  • Journal Article
    Integrating Ecosystem Management, Protected Areas, and Mammal Conservation in the Brazilian Amazon
    (2006) Azevedo-Ramos, Claudia; Domingues do Amaral, Benedito; Nepstad, Daniel; Soares Filho, Britaldo; Nasi, Robert
    "The Amazon forest has been converted to a matrix of pristine and modified habitats. Landscape-scale biodiversity conservation requires an understanding of species' distributions over this matrix to guarantee both effective protection and use for present and future generations. In this study, we evaluated how much of the existing and future planned protected areas (PAs) would be contributing to the conservation of Brazilian Amazon mammals (N = 399), including threatened species (N = 51). Currently, almost 37% of Brazilian Amazon is protected and that may increase to 46% if planned PAs are implemented. In the current PA system, 22% are indigenous land and 11% are sustainable use units, e.g., production forests. Only one-fifth of the whole range of mammal species occurring in Brazilian Amazon is actually protected by Brazilian PAs. However, considering only the part of the ranges within the Brazilian Amazon, and therefore under the scope of Brazilian actions, Brazilian PAs assume an important role in the protection of 39% of mammal distribution ranges, particularly the threatened species (39%). These results suggest that an integrated network of protected areas among Amazon countries would be necessary to increase their efficiency in mammal conservation. The need for strengthening of the forest sector and good management practices in Brazil appears critical for the maintenance of large extents of forest and species conservation. Under such a scenario, the contribution of developed nations and international agencies must assume an important role for the maintenance and enlargement of the protected area network in Amazon region."
  • Journal Article
    Sustainable Forest Management in Cameroon Needs More than Approved Forest Management Plans
    (2008) Cerutti, Paolo Omar; Nasi, Robert; Tacconi, Luca
    "One of the main objectives of the 1994 Cameroonian forestry law is to improve the management of production forests by including minimum safeguards for sustainability into compulsory forest management plans. As of 2007, about 3.5 million hectares (60%) of the productive forests are harvested following the prescriptions of 49 approved management plans. The development and implementation of these forest management plans has been interpreted by several international organizations as long awaited evidence that sustainable management is applied to production forests in Cameroon. Recent reviews of some plans have concluded, however, that their quality was inadequate. This paper aims at taking these few analyses further by assessing the actual impacts that approved management plans have had on sustainability and harvesting of commercial species. We carry out an assessment of the legal framework, highlighting a fundamental flaw, and a thorough comparison between data from approved management plans and timber production data. Contrary to the principles adhered to by the 1994 law, we find that the government has not yet succeeded in implementing effective minimum sustainability safeguards and that, in 2006, 68% of the timber production was still carried out as though no improved management rules were in place. The existence of a number of approved management plans cannot be used a proxy for proof of improved forest management."
  • Journal Article
    Sustainable Forest Management in the Tropics: Is Everything in Order but the Patient Still Dying?
    (2009) Nasi, Robert; Frost, Peter
    "Tropical forests are under unprecedented pressure for conversion to pastoral and agricultural land or to plantations (including for biofuel production) and from the supply and extraction of forest goods and services, including timber and bushmeat. To preserve them, much effort has gone into setting up and managing a network of protected areas because, for various constituencies, conservation is best served by outright protection, occasionally after initial extraction of valuable species. Others, however, see this as an ultimately limited option. They argue the need to include sustainable forest management, balancing productivity and offtake with efforts to conserve biodiversity, maintain vital forest functions, and continue supplying various social and economic benefits, across various scales."
  • Journal Article
    Public Policies and Management of Rural Forests: Lasting Alliance or Fool's Dialogue?
    (2013) Michon, Genevieve; Nasi, Robert; Balent, Gérard
    "Most people in forest and rural areas manage trees as part of their livelihood systems. The resulting 'domestic' or 'rural' forests are distinct from conventional forest. They have historically been overlooked by the forestry sector and impacted by forest policies and regulatory frameworks. These forests presently encounter requalification and valuation dynamics, fueled by a sustainable development ideology, and induced by both public powers and local communities. These dynamics move in two different directions: the naturalization of rural forests by policy makers, and their politization by rural people. We draw on long-term research experiences in France, Morocco, Southeast Asia, and Africa on forests managed by 'farmers', among which some are analyzed in the Ecology and Society Feature, Public policies and management of rural forests: lasting alliance or fool’s dialogue?. We first elaborate on domestication, analyzed at tree, ecosystems and landscape levels, as a concept allowing for a better understanding of the specific relationships developed between rural people and forests. We then engage in a critical review of how forest-related and sustainable development policies consider rural forests, and discuss how they address (or do not address) their specificity and encourage (or do not encourage) their development."
  • Journal Article
    Sustainable Forest Management and Carbon in Tropical Latin America: The Case for REDD+
    (2011) Nasi, Robert; Putz, Francis E.; Pacheco, Pablo; Wunder, Sven; Anta, Salvador
    "In this review paper, we assess the economical, governance, and technical conditions that shape forest management in tropical Latin America with particular regard to efforts to reduce forest-based carbon emissions. We provide a framework for discussions about ways to improve forest management that achieve environmental objectives while promoting local and national development and contributing to local livelihoods. We argue that many management practices that lead towards sustainability are only likely to be adopted where there is good governance backed by financial incentives for effective enforcement of management regulations. We propose some policy interventions designed to lower net greenhouse gas emissions by decreasing rates of forest degradation and increasing carbon stock recovery in logged-over or otherwise degraded forests. Implementation of REDD+ could provide critical compensation to forest users for improved management practices in the absence of, or in combination with other economic incentives."