Reframing Deforestation suggests that the scale of deforestation wrought by West African farmers during the twentieth century has been vastly exaggerated and global analyses have unfairly stigmatised them and obscured their more sustainable, even landscape-enriching practices.
The book begins by reviewing how West African deforestation is represented and the types of evidence which inform deforestation orthodoxy. On a country by country basis (covering Sierra Leone, Liberia, Cote D'Ivoire, Ghana, Togo and Benin), and using historical and social anthropological evidence subsequent chapters evaluate this orthodox critically. Together the cases build up a variety of arguments which serve to reframe history and question how and why deforestation has been exaggerated throughout West Africa, setting the analysis in its institutional and social context.
Stessing that dominant policy approaches in forestry and conservation require major rethinking worldwide, Reframing Deforestation illustrates that more realistic assessments of forest cover change, and more respectful attention to local knowledge and practices, are necessary bases for effective and appropriate environmental policies.

The Forest Primary Production Research Group was born in the Department of S- viculture, University of Helsinki in the early 1970s. Intensive ?eld measurements of photosynthesis and growth of forest vegetation and use of dynamic models in the interpretation of the results were characteristic of the research in the group. Electric instrumentation was based on analogue techniques and the analysis of the obtained measurements was based on self-written programs. Joint research projects with the Research Group of Environmental Physics at the Department of Physics, lead by Taisto Raunemaa (1939-2006) started in the late 1970s. The two research groups shared the same quantitative methodology, which made the co-operation fruitful. Since 1980 until the collapse of the Soviet Union the Academy of Finland and the Soviet Academy of Sciences had a co-operation program which included our team. The research groups in Tartu, Estonia, lead by Juhan Ross (1925-2002) and in Petrozawodsk, lead by Leo Kaipiainen (1932-2004) were involved on the Soviet side. We had annual ?eld measuring campaigns in Finland and in Soviet Union and research seminars. The main emphasis was on developing forest growth models. The research of Chernobyl fallout started a new era in the co-operation between forest ecologists and physicists in Helsinki. The importance of material ?uxes was realized and introduced explicitly in the theoretical thinking and measurements.

This book investigates radiocesium movement in all major components of forest ecosystems, e.g. the plants, animals, insects, microorganisms, and soils, during the initial stage of contamination after the incident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. Most of the work was conducted at a common research site. More specifically, the book examines the contribution of surface uptake by trees in the dynamics of radiocesium during the initial contamination stage; the movement of radiocesium in the form of small organic fragments that are essential to the radiocesium dynamics in forest ecosystems; and the upward movement of radiocesium due to microorganism activity, which promotes the effective decontamination of the forest floor. Lastly, it explains why spiders could be a valuable indicator of the contamination level in forest ecosystems.

The Ogawa Forest Reserve (OFR) is a species-rich, temperate, deciduous, old-growth forest in central Japan in which the ecology of the tree community has been intensively investigated since 1987. Detailed demographic data on the main tree species, covering the entire tree life cycle, were collected to elucidate the mechanisms by which community structure, organization, and species diversity are maintained. Included here is the work of more than 40 scientists in such diverse fields as botany, ecology, pedology, silviculture, mammal ecology, entomology, and ornithology, who have studied the same forest at the same time. This volume introduces the main areas of research under the OFR project and discusses the implications of the results on environmental issues. Integrated studies of this type are essential to clarify how species diversity is maintained, currently a central focus in ecology.

This title offers an inside look at the most successful campaign in forest conservation history. "Roadless Rules" is a fast-paced and insightful look at one of the most important, wide-ranging, and controversial efforts to protect public forests ever undertaken in the United States. In January 2000, President Clinton submitted to the Federal Register the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, prohibiting road construction and timber harvesting in designated roadless areas. Set to take effect sixty days after Clinton left office, the rule was immediately challenged by nine lawsuits from states, counties, off-road-vehicle users, and timber companies. The Bush administration refused to defend the rule and eventually sought to replace it with a rule that invited governors to suggest management policies for forests in their states. That rule was attacked by four states and twenty environmental groups and declared illegal. "Roadless Rules" offers a fascinating overview of the creation of the Clinton roadless rule and the Bush administration's subsequent replacement rule, the controversy generated, the response of the environmental community, and the legal battles that continue to rage more than seven years later. It explores the value of roadless areas and why the Clinton rule was so important to environmentalists, describes the stakeholder groups involved, and takes readers into courtrooms across the country to hear critical arguments. Author Tom Turner considers the lessons learned from the controversy, arguing that the episode represents an excellent example of how the system can work when all elements of the environmental movement work together - local groups and individuals determined to save favourite places, national organizations that represent local interests but also concern themselves with national policies, members of the executive branch who try to serve the public interest but need support from outside, and national organizations that use the legal system to support progress achieved through legislation or executive action.

The increasing awareness and concern of people, researchers and decision makers for the maintenance and enhancement of goods and services provided by forest ecosystems significantly widened the scope of information needs for sustainable forest management on the task-specific, integrative and strategic level. Forest resource assessments have to provide reliable, harmonized, politically relevant, cost-efficient and intuitively visible information on the multiple functions of forests in the form of statistics, georeferenced data and thematic cartography. In this perspective, the need of reviewing and discussing improvements of forest inventory and monitoring approaches is acknowledged to cope with assessment and analysis tools required for the full understanding of forest ecosystems, from local to global scales. Only a limited amount of information can be provided by adding a set of new attributes to the list of attributes commonly used in assessing the productive function of forests and utilizing traditional survey designs. The diversity of information needs that have to be satisfied by current forest resource assessments require the adoption of new survey approaches and the extension of assessment frames from forests to landscapes. This is deemed distinctively true for the issues related to sustainable forest management and biodiversity monitoring. Within this framework, the major purpose of this volume of Kluwers "Forestry Science Series" is to give readers hands-on experiences about inventory and monitoring problems and potential by reviewing a selection of approaches, methods and tools for multi-resource forest surveys, with special reference to remote sensing, statistical sampling and spatial analyses.

Canada and the United States share the world's longest international border. For those living in the immediate vicinity of the Canadian side of the border, the events of 9/11 were a turning point in their relationship with their communities, their American neighbours and government officials. Borderline Canadianness offers a unique ethnographic approach to Canadian border life. The accounts of local residents, taken from interviews and press reports in Ontario's Niagara region, demonstrate how borders and everyday nationalism are articulated in complex ways across region, class, race, and gender. Jane Helleiner's examination begins with a focus on the "de-bordering" initiated by NAFTA and concludes with the "re-bordering" as a result of the 9/11 attacks. Her accounts of border life reveals disconnects between elite border projects and the concerns of ordinary citizens as well as differing views on national belonging. Helleiner has produced a work that illuminates the complexities and inequalities of borders and nationalism in a globalized world.

This comprehensive synthesis systematically covers the entire range of natural and managed oak forests in the highlands of tropical America. Originally, these forests were widely distributed, but largely through human impact large parts have disappeared and the remaining patches are under increasing threat.

For the first time, aspects as diverse as the paleo-ecology, biogeography, stand structure and composition, biodiversity, population dynamics, ecosystem dynamics, fragmentation and recovery, conservation and sustainable use of Neotropical montane oak forests are treated in a coherent manner. Providing a thorough understanding of ecological patterns and processes that determine the structure and functioning of these magnificent forests, this volume can serve as a sound basis for sustainable forest management and biodiversity conservation in general.

This captivating book simply and engagingly captures the vital role forests play in combating the effects of climate change. The reasons for the current and historical demise of the forest are clearly outlined, followed by a fascinating insight into how a forest works to help the local and global environment. There is a solution to global warming which is realistic, attainable and beneficial to the Earth and her inhabitants. Bill Liao and WeForest's laudable goals of making the earth cooler, alleviating poverty and restoring eco-systems are enshrined in the case studies from around the world; vividly demonstrating reasons to be hopeful.

This collection features five peer-reviewed reviews on ecosystem services delivered by forests. The first chapter summarises the current state of knowledge on the interactions between forest ecosystems and the climate system and the way in which forests influence the water cycle. The second chapter reviews the wealth of research on the range of species, functional groups and ecological processes which can develop as a result of the biodiversity in tropical forests. The chapter also considers the main threats to tropical forest biodiversity. The third chapter examines the importance of forest carbon content and the methods currently used to monitor it. The chapter also explores the mechanisms driving forest carbon storage and offers a considered discussion on whether forests should be considered sources or sinks of carbon. The fourth chapter highlights how sustainable forest management (SFM) can be used to maintain or enhance biodiversity in temperate and boreal forests. The chapter utilises two case studies to demonstrate successful implementation of SFM in Ireland and Canada. The final chapter considers the benefits of introducing agroforestry into agroecosystems, focussing on its influence on soil health. The chapter discusses the benefits of agroforestry systems on key soil physical, chemical and biological properties.

This volume synthesizes and analyzes thirty years of hydrological research in the Danum Valley Conservation Area, a lowland dipterocarp rainforest in Sabah, Malaysia. Ian Douglas explores the role of water in the rainforest ecosystem, setting out the ecological, climatological and geological context of present-day hydrological processes, soil erosion and stream sedimentation. He emphasizes the role of extreme events and natural disturbances in sediment supplies and the evolution of drainage pathways and explains the pathways of rainfall and stream sediment. Douglas then explores the impacts caused by logging, the extreme pulses of sedimentation and the effects of log removal and logging road construction, examining the effects of major storms in the 20 years after tree harvesting. Methods of minimizing logging damage to soils and streams are discussed and the effects on flora and fauns are considered.

This book tells the story of Terania Creek - the world's first direct action blockade in defence of a forest, occurring in Australia in 1979. Contrary to claims that the Australian counterculture was a mere imitation of overseas models, the Australian movement, coalescing with a home-grown environment movement, came of age at Terania Creek. After five years of 'polite' campaigning failed to stop the logging of ancient Gondwanan rainforest, an organic and spontaneous blockade erupted that would see the forging of a number of ingenious blockading techniques and strategies. The activist repertoire developed at Terania Creek has since echoed across the country, and across the Earth. This book draws on extensive oral history interviews as well as photographs taken of the protest in 1979; such rich source material brings the story to life. Terania Creek and the Forging of Modern Environmental Activism will therefore appeal to both a scholarly audience as well as activists, practitioners, and counterculturalists.

If you had a trillion dollars and a year to spend it for the good of the world and the advancement of science, what would you do? It's an unimaginably large sum, yet it's only around one per cent of world GDP, and about the valuation of Google, Microsoft or Amazon. It's a much smaller sum than the world found to bail out its banks in 2008 or deal with Covid-19. But what could you achieve with $1 trillion? You could solve the problem of the pandemic, for one, and eradicate malaria, and maybe cure all disease. You could end global poverty. You could settle on the Moon and explore the solar system. You could build a massive particle collider to probe the nature of reality like never before. You could build quantum computers, develop artificial intelligence, or increase human lifespan. You could even create a new life form. Or how about transitioning the world to clean energy? Or preserving the rainforests, or saving all endangered species? Maybe you could refreeze the melting Arctic, launch a new sustainable agricultural revolution, and reverse climate change? How to Spend a Trillion Dollars is the ultimate thought experiment but it is also a call to arms: these are all things we could do, if we put our minds to it - and our money.

This book provides a comprehensive environmental history of how Australia's rainforests developed, the influence of Aborigines and pioneers, farmers and loggers, and of efforts to protect rainforests, to help us better understand current issues and debates surrounding their conservation and use. While interest in rainforests and the movement for their conservation are often mistakenly portrayed as features of the last few decades, the debate over human usage of rainforests stretches well back into the nineteenth century. In the modern world, rainforests are generally considered the most attractive of the ecosystems, being seen as lush, vibrant, immense, mysterious, spiritual and romantic. Rainforests hold a special place; both providing a direct link to Gondwanaland and the dinosaurs and today being the home of endangered species and highly rich in biodiversity. They are also a critical part of Australia's heritage. Indeed, large areas of Australian rainforests are now covered by World Heritage Listing. However, they also represent a dissonant heritage. What exactly constitutes rainforest, how it should be managed and used, and how much should be protected are all issues which remain hotly contested. Debates around rainforests are particularly dominated by the contradiction of competing views and uses - seeing rainforests either as untapped resources for agriculture and forestry versus valuing and preserving them as attractive and sublime natural wonders. Australia fits into this global story as a prime example but is also of interest for its aspects that are exceptional, including the intensity of clearing at certain periods and for its place in the early development of national parks. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of Environmental History, Australian History and Comparative History.

Mobilisation of Forest Bioenergy in the Boreal and Temperate Biomes: Challenges, Opportunities, and Case Studies features input from key international experts who identify and analyze the main opportunities and roadblocks for the implementation of sustainable forest biomass supply chains in the boreal and temperate regions. It draws from responses to surveys that were sent to specialists from different countries, compares models of bioenergy deployment, and discusses different types of bioenergy carriers. Efficiency and profitability of the supply chain are analyzed and the scale and level of confidence of feedstock inventory estimates are highlighted. Logistics and ecological and socio-economic footprints are also covered. This book provides a synthesis of the scientific and technical literature on specific aspects of forest biomass supply chains, and quantifies future potentials in comparison to estimates provided by other sources and the targets for bioenergy production set by various organizations (IEA, IPCC, etc.). Finally, the book proposes recommendations for practitioners, policymakers, and future research. This approach makes the book especially relevant for professionals, policymakers, researchers, and graduate students in the field of bioenergy conversion and management, as well as those interested in sustainable management of natural resources.

'A bold, ambitious and truly wonderful history of the world' Peter Wohlleben, author of The Hidden Life of Trees 'A fascinating story and a crucial revision of the momentous importance of tropical forests to human history' Lewis Dartnell, author of Origins _________________________ Jungle tells the remarkable story of the world's tropical forests, from the arrival of the first plants millions of years ago to the role of tropical forests in the evolution of the world's atmosphere, the dinosaurs, the first mammals and even our own species and ancestors. Highlighting provocative new evidence garnered from cutting-edge research, Dr Roberts shows, for example, that our view of humans as 'savannah specialists' is wildly wrong, and that the 'Anthropocene' began not with the Industrial Revolution, but potentially as early as 6,000 years ago in the tropics. We see that the relationship between humankind and 'jungles' is deep-rooted, that we are all connected to their destruction, and that we must all act to save them. Urgent, clear-sighted and original, Jungle challenges the way we think about the world - and ourselves. _________________________ 'Welcome to the "Jungle" - a breathtaking book' Mark Maslin, author of How to Save Our Planet 'Timely, readable and highly relevant' Steve Brusatte, author of The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs 'Its revelations and stories will stir, rearrange and populate your mind for years to come' Paul Hawken, editor of Drawdown 'Brilliant ... it delivers a timely warning about our abuse of the environment' David Abulafia, author of The Great Sea 'Finally, a book on rainforests that does justice to their majesty and importance' Simon Lewis, co-author of The Human Planet

Large ungulates in tropical forests are among the most threatened taxa of mammals. Excessive hunting, degradation of and encroachments on their natural habitats by humans have contributed to drastic reductions in wild ungulate populations in recent decades. As such, reliable assessments of ungulate-habitat relationships and the spatial dynamics of their populations are urgently needed to provide a scientific basis for conservation efforts. However, such rigorous assessments are methodologically complex and logistically difficult, and consequently many commonly used ungulate population survey methods do not address key problems. As a result of such deficiencies, key parameters related to population distribution, abundance, habitat ecology and management of tropical forest ungulates remain poorly understood. This book addresses this critical knowledge gap by examining how population abundance patterns in five threatened species of large ungulates vary across space in the tropical forests of the Nagarahole-Bandipur reserves in southwestern India. It also explains the development and application of an innovative methodology - spatially explicit line transect sampling - based on an advanced hierarchical modelling under the Bayesian inferential framework, which overcomes common methodological deficiencies in current ungulate surveys. The methods and results presented provide valuable reference material for researchers and professionals involved in studying and managing wild ungulate populations around the globe.

This book aims to provide a comprehensive analysis on social, economic, and political issues to understand why forests in the Demacratic People's Repblican of Korean have been so severely deforested. Deforestation and forest degradation issues in the DPRK has been highlighted as an important international political issue, which has been intervening with food security issues and energy issues, and it's hard to discover the way out. The DPRK provides a unique case to international community that illustrate why the forests issue is so complex, illuminating the issues of declining forest coverage that beset developing nations around the world. This book will interest political scientists, conservation ecologists, and journalists.

Colonial Geography charts changes in conceptions of the relationship between people and landscapes in mainland Tanzania during the German colonial period. In German minds, colonial development would depend on the relationship between East Africans and the landscape. Colonial Geography argues that the most important element in German imperialism was not its violence but its attempts to apply racial thinking to the mastery and control of space. Utilizing approaches drawn from critical geography, the book argues that the development of a representational space of empire had serious consequences for German colonialism and the population of East Africa. Colonial Geography shows how spatial thinking shaped ideas about race and empire in the period of New Imperialism.

For a decade Philip Connors has spent nearly half of each year in a 7' x 7' fire lookout tower, 10,000 feet above sea level, keeping watch over one of the most fire-prone forests in America. Fire Season is his remarkable reflection on work, untamed fire, our place in the wild, and the charms of solitude. Written with narrative verve and startling beauty, and filled with heartfelt reflections on his literary forebears who also served as "freaks on the peaks"--among them Edward Abbey, Jack Kerouac, and Norman Maclean--Fire Season is a book to stand the test of time.

Forests are restless. When a tree dies or a new one sprouts, the forest that includes it shifts. When new trees sprout in the same direction, the whole forest begins to migrate, sometimes at astonishing rates. Today, however, an array of obstacles-humans felling trees by the billions, invasive pests transported through global trade-threaten to overwhelm these vital movements. Worst of all, the climate is changing faster than ever before and forests are struggling to keep up. A deft blend of science reporting and travel writing, The Journeys of Trees explores the evolving movements of forests by focusing on five trees: giant sequoia, ash, black spruce, Florida torreya and Monterey pine. Zach St George visits these trees in forests across continents, finding sequoias losing their needles in California, fossil records showing the paths of ancient forests in Alaska, domesticated pines in New Zealand and new sprouts of blight-resistant American chestnuts in New Hampshire. Everywhere he goes, St George meets lively people on conservation's front lines, from an ecologist studying droughts to an evolutionary evangelist with plans to save a dying species. He treks through the woods with activists, biologists and foresters, each with their own role to play in the fight for the uncertain future of our environment. An eye-opening investigation into forest migration past and present, The Journeys of Trees examines how we can all help our trees, and our planet, survive and thrive.

This book brings together information on road planning, location, design, construction and maintenance to support environmentally acceptable operations in tropical forests. It highlights the challenges of road operations in the tropics, includes techniques that have been shown to be successful, and discusses newer technologies. Numerical examples are included to provide clarity for interpreting graphs, procedures, and formulas.

This collection features five peer-reviewed literature reviews on developing forestry products. The first chapter discusses trade-offs between timber products from plantation forests and the need to protect ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration. It reviews ways of innovating business practices, the use of solid wood, reconstituted products and woody biomass as products. The second chapter explores hardwood tree management within agroforestry systems for the production of veneer and high-quality sawlogs. It reviews how to optimise production in alley cropping, riparian buffers and silvopasture systems. The third chapter assesses the range of non-timber forest products from tropical forests. These include non-wood fiber resources, including bamboo, rattan and agricultural biomass. These can be used to replace traditional wood fibers in both building and non-structural applications. The fourth chapter focusses on new processes and applications of forestry products. It discusses cellulose pulp conversion into cellulosic nanomaterials, hydrolysis of hemicelluloses from wood to produce sugars for use in the food industry, as well as extraction of polyphenols from bark for nutraceuticals. The final chapter reviews alley cropping practices to produce overstory nut crops. It discusses genetic improvement of nut trees, orchard design and management as well as pest management in nut tree alley cropping.

This book demonstrates the social, historical, and environmental framework within which humans have developed a relationship with the forest and its resources. Starting from the biological basis that permits the existence of forests to the use of forest resources in a modern human context, this book summarizes the interaction between humans and forest ecosystems. Designed for readers from a broad range of disciplines and interests including those from environmental sciences, environmental economics, sociology, anthropology, biology, forestry and human ecology and other related disciplines, the book evokes interest in the development of an integrated approach towards forest ecosystems and natural resources in the context of sustainability.