Forest Policy

STRESZCZENIE: Celem badania było oszacowanie zmiennych wpływających na korzyści rekreacyjne generowane przez ekosystemy leśne Europy. W tym celu zgromadzono badania rekreacyjne przeprowadzone w krajach europejskich w latach 1970-2012. Zgromadzona baza danych zawiera zarówno badania preferencji ujawnionych, jak i preferencji deklarowanych. Łącznie zgromadzono 53 badania, z ośmiu krajów, które zawierają 252 indywidualnych oszacowań. Badania zostały przeprowadzone na terenie 73 różnych kompleksów leśnych na łącznej próbie ponad 40 000 osób. Dokonano tak zwanej metaanalizy, w której zmienną zależną jest gotowość do płacenia (WTP) lub nadwyżka konsumenta na osobę (CS). W badaniu podjęto próbę wyjaśnienia zmienności w WTP (CS) za pomocą zmiennych metodologicznych charakteryzujących badanie oraz charakterystyk badanych obiektów -w tym przypadku charakterystyk odwiedzanych lasów. Przeprowadzona analiza wskazuje, że ceteris paribus lasy, położone na terenie parków narodowych, dostarczają wyższych korzyści rekreacyjnych, a badania przeprowadzone w późniejszym latach związane są z wyższym poziomem nadwyżki konsumenta. Wynik ten może wskazywać, że preferencje konsumentów zmieniają się w czasie i ludzie osiągają coraz to wyższe (w ujęciu realnym) korzyści rekreacyjne z tytułu wizyt w lesie.

The designations employed and the presentation of material in this information product do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) concerning the legal or development status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The mention of specific companies or products of manufacturers, whether or not these have been patented, does not imply that these have been endorsed or recommended by FAO in preference to others of a similar nature that are not mentioned. The views expressed in this information product are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of FAO.

This report is the first in a series of case studies that IIASA has initiated in different regions of the Russian Federation. Studies are under way in the Karelian Republic as well as in the regions of Arkhangelsk, Moscow, Murmansk, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, and Khabarovsk. All these reports deal with institutional aspects of the Russian forest sector. The present report on the Tomsk region will be supplemented with a report presenting the results of interviews with representatives of forest enterprises in the region. The research has been made possible through financial support from The Swedish Council for Planning and Coordination of Research (FRN) and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (KVA). We gratefully acknowledge the help of Dr. Alexander S. Sulakshin, who has served as the local coordinator in Tomsk. We would also like to thank Mrs. Olga Cherkashina, who has been helpful in conducting interviews and colecting data. A large number of people have provided valuable information and given useful comments on earlier drafts of the report. We would also like to thank all those who have spent time on answering our questions and especially Sergei Budlov and Viktor Lukov, Tomsk, who initially gave the project their support.

SUMMARYInternational negotiations for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and the enhancement of forest carbon stocks (REDD+) under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) were finally concluded in 2015. However, due to the complex design and implementation processes of REDD+ policies and measures, including benefit sharing at national and subnational levels, several challenges exist for sustainably reducing emissions while simultaneously managing the provision of social and environmental side-objectives. We review the realities of REDD+ implementation in 13 REDD+ candidate countries and the risks related to REDD+ policies and benefit sharing based upon a synthesis of the findings presented in ‘country profiles’ that were developed between 2009 and 2013 as part of the Center for International Forestry Research's (CIFOR) Global Comparative Study on REDD+. We find that REDD+ policies in all countries studied are at high risk of ineffectivene...

Early adoption of national-and project-level social and environmental standards suggests that REDD+ policy makers, project personnel and investors value REDD+ safeguards. • To gain national-level buy-in for REDD+ safeguards, national sovereignty must be recognised and competing safeguard policies should be harmonised. • The REDD+ safeguards dialogue needs to move away from highlevel international discussions and towards action. This includes introducing guidelines, low-cost strategies and capacity building to support the interpretation, implementation, monitoring and reporting of safeguards. REDD+ safeguards are policies and measures that address both direct and indirect impacts of REDD+ on communities and ecosystems. They do this by identifying, analysing and managing risks and opportunities (Murphy 2011). The Cancun Agreement reached at the 16 th Conference of the Parties

This work is a part of international research that was carried out in Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, in order to investigate policy drivers behind the harvesting level in these countries. This thesis was focused on Lithuania. However, a comparative analysis of future tendencies ...

The Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEFCC) amended the Forest Conservation Act (FCA), now called the Van Sanrakshan Evam Samvardhan Adhiniyan), in 2023. Its mission was to ease and speed up forest diversion for non-forestry purposes to contribute to the government's primary agenda of 'ease of doing business'. It targeted the definition of 'forest' itself: confine the application of the FCA to only the notified forests. FCA empowers the foresters, the officers and frontline staff of the Forest Department, to divert the forests for non-forestry purposes. The 2023 amendment rolls back the definition of 'forest' advanced by the Supreme Court. This would mean removing at least 1.99 lakh sq km from the foresters' authority to decide on whether land can be diverted or not. This was a big letdown of the foresters when the hegemony over the forest land had vastly expanded by about a third with the Supreme Court redefining what 'forest' is.

This study examines the socio-ecological impacts of soybean cultivation in the Brazilian Amazon, a region of critical importance for global climate regulation and biodiversity conservation. It explores how the expansion of soybean cultivation in this region since the 1990s, driven by international demand and domestic policies, has triggered a series of unsustainable socio-ecological consequences, such as deforestation, overuse of agrochemicals, displacement of indigenous communities, and land tenure conflicts. Inadequate governance, at both national and international levels, has exacerbated these challenges, undermining efforts to balance soybean cultivation with sustainable development in Brazilian Amazon. Through a mixed analysis method, this study proposes pathways for sustainable soybean production in the Amazon, including extending the Soy Moratorium to the Cerrado, strengthening indigenous land rights, enhancing international cooperation, and adopting sustainable agricultural practices such as agroforestry. These findings contributes to reconciling soybean cultivation with sustainable development in the Brazilian Amazon.

This study examines the socio-ecological impacts of soybean cultivation in the Brazilian Amazon, a region of critical importance for global climate regulation and biodiversity conservation. It explores how the expansion of soybean cultivation in this region since the 1990s, driven by international demand and domestic policies, has triggered a series of unsustainable socio-ecological consequences, such as deforestation, overuse of agrochemicals, displacement of indigenous communities, and land tenure conflicts. Inadequate governance, at both national and international levels, has exacerbated these challenges, undermining efforts to balance soybean cultivation with sustainable development in Brazilian Amazon. Through a mixed analysis method, this study proposes pathways for sustainable soybean production in the Amazon, including extending the Soy Moratorium to the Cerrado, strengthening indigenous land rights, enhancing international cooperation, and adopting sustainable agricultural practices such as agroforestry. These findings contributes to reconciling soybean cultivation with sustainable development in the Brazilian Amazon.

This article explores the historical evolution of log measurement in Nepal’s forestry sector, tracing its development and expansion over time. The review draws on available data and information, supplemented by insights from informal discussions with timber producers, wood traders, processing entities, and independent forest experts. These sources help identify both internal and external factors that have influenced changes in the standards. The sequence of events allows one to suspect that the decision has been made to change the log scaling standards in a manner that favors timber traders. Within this context, the article critically examines the economic and political dimensions of the changes, highlighting their adverse impacts - particularly the undervaluation of logs - on the incomes of log harvesting workers, private tree owners, smallholder farmers, and community forest groups.
Drawing on the critical analysis of available data, as well as the author's academic training and professional experience, the article challenges the notion that the revision process was free from interest group influence. It argues instead that vested interests played a significant role in shaping the outcomes. The paper further anticipates that replacing the current standards with more refined ones could significantly boost the wages of workers, small farmers, and forest users, while also enhancing government revenue. To address this, the article concludes with a fivepoint policy recommendation aimed at encouraging relevant agencies to take appropriate action.

This paper maps the policy actors and their networks in the European Union's Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan and the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) process in the Lao People's Democratic Republic (Lao PDR). It analyzes power relations in the FLEGT VPA process, as well as actors' preferences in relation to a number of policy issues dealt with in the FLEGT VPA. To provide contextual understanding, the paper explores pathways of policy influence along which international actors influence domestic decision-making processes within the FLEGT VPA. We find that in the Lao FLEGT VPA policy process, power is held by the traditionally most powerful policy actors, the central governmental agencies, donor community and international development partners, while the private sector, civil society organizations and actors from subnational levels are substantially less powerful. Strong policy preferences were noted for all aspects of timber legality, except for the legality of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). Similarly, strong preferences were observed for considerations of transparency and accountability, while preferences were comparatively weaker for issues concerning i) forest communities' rights to forest and land, ii) livelihood impacts on small-scale operators and family businesses as well as those of forest communities, and iii) the involvement of civil society organizations in the VPA process. The most dominant pathways through which VPA influences domestic policy-making is the direct access to domestic policy-making, followed by the international rules pathway of influence. Based on our analysis, we argue that imbalance in distribution of power and in representation of actors in the VPA policy network may obstruct the intended outcomes and progress on important policy issues, despite the stated policy goals and resources provided by the donor community. This in turn fosters perpetual dominance of the traditionally powerful policy actors, which is likely to lead to further marginalization and disempowerment of the less powerful actors, such as forest communities and informal operators.

Decentralization in post-Soeharto Indonesia has not only changed state and society relations at the local level, but brought increased control over forests at the district level. Local social forces gained more influence because of their close relations with local government and acted to limit the local government. In this article we use the case of Malinau, East Kalimantan Indonesia to show how the new local autonomy over forests played a role in the rise of new local political orders.

Joint Forest Management focuses on empowerment of forest dwelling communities both socially and economically. The present study attempts to analyse the government policies, programmes and legal provisions regarding JFM with emphasis on empowerment in the Madhya Pradesh context.

One of the major thrusts of the empowerment is capacity development. The efforts made by the Forest Department in capacity development are not yet able to yield the desired results in the field. However, there has been a basic shift towards empowerment and a large number of people, at least feel, that they are politically, socially and personally empowered after being involved in JFM. The translation of the empowerment into actual practice is going to be a major challenge for the sustainability of the JFM in the future.

The Amazon rainforest is crucial for the global carbon cycle, yet annual changes in its aboveground biomass carbon (AGC) stock remain highly uncertain. Natural and local anthropogenic drivers such as deforestation, forest degradation, and regrowth following deforestation interact with largescale climate variability to determine AGC dynamics. Here, we propose an approach to disaggregate low-frequency passive L-band microwave data over 2010-2020 and reconstruct maps of annual change. We show that the Amazon lost -0.37 ± 0.17 PgC, with gains by undisturbed (0.33 ± 0.13 PgC) and secondary forest growth (0.33 ± 0.05 PgC) outweighed by losses by deforestation (-0.55 ± 0.04 PgC), degradation (-0.42 ± 0.08 PgC), and agricultural areas (-0.06 ± 0.03 PgC). Losses in human-influenced land intensified over time and amounted to 60% of all gross losses in El Niño years. Our study reinforces the need for stronger implementation of policies and effective actions to control forest degradation. The Amazon rainforest plays a central role in the global carbon cycle. Accounting for 14% of the total atmospheric carbon fixed by plants annually , it stores 102 ± 26 PgC in aboveground biomass carbon (AGC) 2 , equivalent to 28% of global AGC . Human activity has reduced the carbon storage capacity of the Amazon through deforestation and forest degradation, with 20% of its original extent converted to other land uses and 5.5% of the remaining forests degraded by fire, logging and fragmentation . Yet, despite a reduction in deforestation levels since 2005, the Amazon has been cleared at an average rate of 7927 km 2 year -1 since 2010, with an increasing trend since 2016, and degradation continues to increase 7 . Recent vertical profiling measurements of atmospheric CO 2 concentration showed that the southeastern part of the forest has become a net carbon source 8 , pointing toward a decline of the Amazon forest sink of 0.37 PgC year -1 between 2001 and 2019 9,10 . The effective implementation of policies for forest conservation requires an improved understanding of the dynamics of all components and processes that lead to biomass change, and an attribution if such changes happen in natural or human-influenced land.

In 2015 the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, building on the Millennium Development Goals, was adopted by the UN member states. The SDGs, and in particular SDG 17 (Partnerships for the goals), have emphasized global partnerships as a means of overcoming the shortcomings of the MDGs in relation to Goal 8 (To develop a global partnership for development) (UN System Task Team, 2012: 5). In these regards, partnerships at the global level between governments, as well with other stakeholders such as the private sector, are described as being essential (Lomazzi et al, 2014). This was in response to known power asymmetries in international arrangements, namely, a Northern-driven agenda and a bias in governance forms that favour international organizations, governmental actors and a strong private sector, while dismissing Southern and local participation as well as non-state actors and authorities (Menashy, 2019). SDG 17 is essential for, and thus should be integrated by, all other SDGs, including SDG 15 (Life on land). While the other SDGs focus on economic development, social rights or cooperation, SDG 15 flags terrestrial ecosystems, and correspondingly forests, as being essential for sustainable development. Forest ecosystems are assigned a particular role not only in SDG 15 but also in other SDGs, building a 'complex relationship' between them (Baumgartner, 2019: 1). This is in part due to their geographic scope (with forest covering about one third of the world's land area) but also because of the goods and services they provide: timber and non-timber forest products; a fundamental basis for ecological processes (CO 2 mitigation, water supply and quality); habitat for plants and animals; basis for livelihood and human well-being; and a

This paper analyses the European Union's (EU's) democratising agenda within the frame of the EU's Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA) in Laos. In particular, it focuses on the requirement for the participation of civil society organisations (CSOs) in the VPA and the Lao state actors' responses to this requirement. I frame the VPA's democratising agenda and its conditionality of civil society participation as acts of governmentality exercised by the EU in Laos. This EU governmentality is exercised through the EU and EU member states' funded development partner in the frame of their project supporting the FLEGT VPA process in Laos. The Lao government responses and strategies to the EU governmentality resulted on the one hand in the Lao state's governmentality towards domestic CSOs, and in counter-conduct (i.e. a subtle and sly resistance to some aspects of the VPA) on the other. First, by tracing the establishment of the Lao FLEGT Civil Society Organisations Network (FLEGT CSO Network), I highlight the trend of depoliticisation and rendering technical, where the EU-funded development partner, with full support and backing from the Lao state, trained the CSOs in various VPA and timber legality issues. In the training, the CSOs were given specific roles and tasks, building up their fields of expertise, and were integrated in the formal VPA organisational structures, which allowed for their scrutiny and tight survelience by the state. Second, I analyse the counter-conduct by the Lao government against a civil society that is independent from the state, which the government manifested through further disempowerment of CSOs and tightening of the CSO regulation shortly after the FLEGT CSO Network was established, while at the same time simulating democratisation by welcoming CSOs' participation in the VPA. Summoning CSOs as compliant actors and unpaid service providers working for and alongside the state was in part enabled by the VPA's own rendering technical approach. Hence, the EU's VPA governmentality and the Lao state counter-conduct mutually reinforced one another, even if their initial agendas around democratisation and CSO engagement in forest governance and the VPA diverged.

Muitos são os desafios nas práticas e experiências no campo da teoria democrática na atualidade. Considerando que a participação ocorre através da representação, neste capítulo analisamos a participação e representatividade do conselho gestor da APA Lago do Amapá, considerando o recorte temporal para o período de 2004 a 2022.
Palavras-chave: Gestão participativa, Representatividade e Unidades de Conservação.

Research examined how partnerships of state and civil society could function to manage commercially valuable non-wood forest products in Community Forests in Cameroon. Results indicate an effective governance arrangement should include the Ministry of Environment and Forests and the Community Forest management committee, and also increase the involvement of women. An adaptive collaborative management approach could bring together stakeholders to learn collectively how to manage resources sustainably. Partnerships with nongovernmental organizations and research organizations would enhance the process leading to an improved governance system. Future Scenarios, was found to be an effective tool for facilitation of social learning with stakeholders.

International aid for biodiversity conservation is expected to provide alternative livelihoods for forest-dependent communities to offset restrictions on forest use. This aligns with the contemporary conservation discourse that promotes pro-poor, human rightsbased, and sustainability principles. We used the Central Africa Forest Ecosystem Program (ECOFAC), the longest-running EUfunded initiative with nearly 200 million euros invested for about 30 years, as a case study to analyze how international aid, has attempted to achieve fair and sustainable conservation practices. Through a longitudinal study of the design of ECOFAC, we assessed its implementation arrangements, budget distribution, prioritized technical solutions, and target actors to identify to whom it has benefited the most (winners) and for whom it has not been beneficial or even harmful (losers). Our findings show that the EU biodiversity conservation program has prioritized the reinforcement of state administrations to strengthen their coercive power in protected areas. A co-dependency has developed between transnational actors, preferred by the EU as implementing partners, and state conservation actors. This relationship has become a barrier to meaningful reform within ECOFAC despite decades of policy learning. The pro-poor discourse and human rights concerns of the EU aid have not been reflected in the types of activities funded nor in the level of investments aimed at incentivizing forest-dependent communities to support conservation restrictions. EU policymakers need to pay more attention to how their interventions in biodiversity conservation policies create or reinforce power asymmetries and inequality, especially in Central Africa.

New governance scholarship argues that a blend of public and private regulation is playing an increasing role in influencing firm behavior. Despite its burgeoning growth, new governance scholarship is critiqued as lacking practical examples. This Article begins to fill that void by conducting a new institutional economics analysis of forest sustainability certifications, an example of new governance. This Article analyzes the features of the domestic forest industry to trace why new governance emerged within it and has persisted for over seventy years. The industrial characteristics that contribute to this longstanding new governance regime include strong norms within the industry, a resource-type that favors user-developed rules, and robust competition among private actors to regulate the industry. These findings suggest that new governance may emerge as a regulatory tool to address environmental problems in other industries that possess similar characteristics. The Article also sheds light into the broader discussion of how to measure the "success" of new governance regimes. It identifies stakeholder involvement relative to the democratic process and displacement of other regulatory tools as two key considerations in evaluating new governance approaches.

Slums evolved as by-product of unplanned urbanization. Rapid and unscientific Urbanization is a greater threat to the developing countries all over the world especially for the socially and economically weaker section. People migrate from rural areas and settle in the fringes of cities and towns for better livelihood irrespective of caste, class and gender. Slums in Chennai are being voluntarily evicted and resettled in outskirts of Chennai city to create slum free cities. This has drastic drawbacks in the life of slums dwellers and children. As majority of people live in slums are from socially and economically backwards their lives are at risk. The paper will give impact of children and their development due to eviction and resettlement. The paper will look into aspects of ignorance and negligence from the government side for timely establishment of schools and other developmental institutions for the disadvantaged children. As many studies in India have revealed that the majority of people living in slums are from scheduled caste community. And impact on how it leads to the developmental stagnation among the disadvantaged section of children. So the resettlement of slums is a greatest disadvantage/drawback for the girls in their educational development which obviously have impact on their SocioEconomic empowerment.

Environmental and climatic disruption has been apparent with alarming incidences reported from across the globe. It is important to develop strategies to prevent and mitigate the massive devastations caused in recent years including in incidences like the recurrent Amazon Forest fires or the bushfires in Australia. Due to the temperature rise, India has been facing natural disasters including flash floods, tsunamis on the one hand, and issues of drought, unseasonal crop damage, and so on. Added to that is the lack of adequate and 'safe' drinking water, along with the discussions regarding the role of citizens in conserving and preserving biodiversity for reversing this global disparaging trend. This paper takes a look at the entire gamut of issues and challenges from a gender perspective by analysing the existing Biological Diversity Act, 2002 that focuses on the preservation of biological diversity in the country and provides a mechanism for equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the use of traditional biological resources and knowledge. Drawing on the literature, the paper discusses the scope of the Act that mandates mechanisms to respect and protect the rights, especially concerning the freedom of end-users, which includes women. Additionally, it will touch upon the Amended Biological Diversity Act of 2023 and the implementation plan as provisioned.

Farmers' understanding of several Indonesia Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) parameters, including land legality and forest fires, is the focus of this study. ISPO certification poses a risk to households with a diverse income structure. The threat posed by oil palm plantations to natural resources and the environment will continue to be significant challenges.

Indigenous forests and savannas, along with plantation forests, offer numerous benefits to rural communities and society at large. Yet, the role of forests and forestry in contributing to sustainable livelihoods and poverty alleviation are widely debated. However, much of the debate pertains to lessons from the humid tropics, with little consideration of the widespread dry forests and savannas. This paper considers the role of dry forest types, including savannas, using South Africa as a case example. It concludes that a large proportion of the population makes use of forests and the resources from them. These are vital components of local livelihoods, which probably prevent people from slipping into deeper poverty. Moreover, for a measurable proportion, engagement in informal forest activities, as well as the formal forestry sector, has resulted in them being able to move out of poverty. Additionally, the generally dry nature of forests in South Africa, coupled with the high unemployment rate, limit the extent of alternative locally based livelihood options, thereby magnifying the contributions from forests and forest products. The depressing effects of widespread HIV/AIDS on labour availability, economic activities and livelihoods has exacerbated peoples' dependence on forest products.

Sanırım şu sıralar yurttaşlarımızın çoğunluğu orman yangınlarını dert ediniyor. Ne denli dert edinse yeridir. Ancak, "yangın mevsimi" geçtiğinde bu kaygılar, üzüntüler, çoğu bilinçsizlik ve bilgisizlik örneği açıklamalar, tartışmalar yine giderek sönümlenecek. Hep öyle oldu çünkü. Bu bir yana, dikkatinizi çekti mi, bilmiyorum; yine çoğunlukla "top taca atılıyor": Ormancılığımızda olup bitenler hemen hemen hiçbir boyutuyla gerektiğince tartışılmıyor. Oysa yangınların yanı sıra "devlet ormanı" sayılan yerler ile bu yerlerdeki tüm ekosistemlerde yaşananların çoğu, doğrudan ya da dolaylı olarak ormancılık karar, hukuksal ve kurumsal düzenlemeler ile uygulamalarının -ormancılık politikalarının-sonuçlarıdır. Bu nedenle ormancılığımızda nerelerde, nelerin, neden ve kimlerce nasıl yapıldığı, hiç ya da gerektiğince yapılmadığı ile ne sonuçlar verdiği ilgili ormancılık meslek örgütlerinin yanı sıra çevre, doğa, orman "korumacısı" kişi ve kuruluşlar, ekolojistler ile toplumbilimciler, ekonomi politikacılar tarafından da sorgulanması gerekiyor. Sorgulanmıyor. Oysa ormancılığımızda yaşamsal önemde gelişmeler yaşanıyor. Bu nedenle sıkça diyorum ki; sonuçları sergilemek, "olumsuz" olduğu düşünülen sonuçlar karşısında kaygılanmak ve yakınmanın yanı sıra bu sonuçlara yol açan ormancılık düzenleme ve uygulamalar da azıcık (!) sorgulansa, tartışılsa "kıyamet mi kopar"? Bu "… Sessiz Tartışmalar"da kimi ormancılık düzenleme ve uyguları ile gerçekliklere birkaç örnek vereceğim; bakalım "kıyamet kopacak" mı… Selamlarımla. Sıkça söylediğim -"yakındığım"-gibi; ormancılığımızda da hiç olmaması gereken denli sık, çeşitli, dahası çoğu birbirleriyle çelişkili hukuksal, kurumsal, teknik düzenleme ve uygulamalar yapılıyor, sıkça da değiştiriliyor. İlk bakışta "işbilmezlikle", el yordamıyla ya da "rastlantısal" olarak yapıldığı sanısı veren bu değişikliklerin çoğunluğu ortak bir amacın ürünü. Böyleyken öncelikle bu "ortak amacın" sorgulanması yerine değişikliklerin yol açtığı sonuçların en görünenleri ya da bilinenleri (?) çoğunlukla tek tek sorgulanıp "tartışılıyor". Sözgelimi; orman yangınları ve yol açtığı yıkımların giderek büyümesinin, başta madencilik olmak üzere arazi temelli çeşitli etkinliklerin hızla yaygınlaştırılması vb. Bu arada "tartışılıyor", sözün gelişi kuşkusuz: Çoğunlukla hemen hemen hiç tartışılmıyor. Dolayısıyla; söylenenlerin ya da yazılanların çoğu söylenip yazıldığıyla kalıyor. Deneyimli konu uzmanı ormancı çalışanların, araştırıcı ve bilim insanların yıllardır yaptığı uyarı ve öneriler gerektiğince dikkate alınmıyor. Şu sıralar Dünya Bankası'ndan aldığı 400 milyon dolarlık borçla İDOP (İklime Dirençli Ormancılık Projesi) başlıklı "projeyi" yürüten OGM'nin (Orman Genel Müdürlüğü) 27 ile 30 Haziran 2025 günlerinde web sitesinde yer verdiği açıklama da bu gerçeği ortaya koyuyor 1 . Ancak, ilginçtir; kimse de bu durumdan yakınmıyor, aşılması için gerekli çabalara girmiyor. Böylece "devran da", kolaylıkla istenildiği gibi döndürülebiliyor. Bu nedenle önce, sıkça vurguladığım kimi temel gerçekliklerin başlıcalarını bir kez daha anımsatmak istiyorum 2 . Öteden beri bilinen birçok temel gerçek artık ya unutuldu ya akıl almaz bir hızla değişiyor çünkü. Daha doğrusu siyasal ortaklığın başarıyla (!) istediği gibi oluşturduğu gündemin değişkenliği içinde onların anımsamasına sıra gelmiyor yahut böylesi daha kolay; üstelik dokuncası da -"rizikosu"-görece az oluyor. * Örneğin; Anayasanın 43 (Kıyılardan yararlanma), 44 (Toprak mülkiyeti), 45 (Tarım, hayvancılık ve bu üretim dallarında çalışanların korunması), 63 (Tarih, kültür ve tabiat varlıklarının korunması) ile 169 (Ormanların korunması ve geliştirilmesi) maddeleri. ** Öyle ki, bırakınız ormancılık dışı kullanımları, en son 2019 yılında çıkarılan Ağaçlandırma Yönetmeliği'nin 11. maddesine göre gerçek ve tüzel kişiler "özel ağaçlandırma" ve "özel imar ihya" çalışması yapabilecekleri "devlet ormanı" sayılan yerleri, üstelik bu yerlerde yapabilecekleri çalışmaları bile büyük ölçüde kendileri belirleyip önerebiliyor. Sürekli olarak gündeme getirmeye çabaladığım "mekânsal strateji planı" hazırlık çalışmalarıysa bir türlü sonuçlandırılamıyor.

Parallel to agriculture forestry is very important as component of rural development in Lithuania: income source for rural population, employment, nature and wild life habitat conservation as well as enrichment. The private forest sector today constitutes 239,900 private forest owners. Private forest owners control approximately 698,000 ha of forest, 33.4% of the total forest area. Small-scale private forestry is developing in Lithuania. The development production wood and non-wood products as well as providing services (forest berries, mushrooms and medicinal herbs, hunting, countryside tourism) are potential source of income for rural people. In Lithuania about 600 thousand ha land is abandoned. Afforestation of abandoned agriculture land creates conditions for development of private forestry and rural areas. This process has positive impact to new workplaces creation and nature conservation. Rural Development Plan for 2004-2006 is one of the most important programs of EU financia...

Reform in the forest sector in Peru resulted in a new forestry law, developed with substantial input from international conservation and donor organizations. While it incorporates the principles of sustainable forest management, biodiversity conservation and livelihood improvement, inconsistencies remain between the regulatory mechanisms and actual practices and outcomes in the field, leading some to consider the legal framework a failure. This article suggests that problems in the sector persist because the legal and regulatory frameworks do not incorporate existing local institutions, norms and practices -all of which are rooted in complex historical social, political and economic relationships. Based on information from interviews, data on movement of timber and analysis of secondary information, the authors examine the local structure, actors and dynamics of the concession forestry system in the Peruvian Amazon. The article focuses on how financial, social and political relationships in the network of actors, and particularly the patronage system, have helped actors in the sector adapt to the new policy framework. It is proposed that any further reform in the forest sector must be based on a keen understanding and appreciation of the praxis of timber extraction in the region. This research was supported by two Tinker Foundation grants to the two authors and by the Peru Fulbright Commission to Robin Sears while at Columbia University. Field research involved many interviews with loggers, resource owners and woodsmen in the field, and with officials in local, regional and national agencies. We acknowledge their willingness to share sometimes sensitive information. We gratefully acknowledge the input to and review of the manuscript by Christine Padoch and Louis Putzel, and the comments from three anonymous reviewers.

The paper presents how the Analytic Hierarchy Process can be used to select the most suitable combination of new forest roads to build onto a forested area provided that social or ecological aspects are not jeopardized. All important features worth being considered when a new network of forest roads is designed were grouped in three types of criteria, which are benefits, costs and risks. Further, in order to ease the pairwise comparisons between criteria, both benefits and costs have been divided into private and social, while the risks refer to the events that might be triggered or favoured by the construction of new roads, like habitat fragmentation, landslides in case of heavy rainfall during the construction phase or even illegal cuttings. The outcome consists of a series of benefit-cost-and-risk indices and benefit-cost ratios, one for each combination of forest roads, including the status quo. The method has been tested on three combinations of new forest roads already designed for a small forest management unit located in Prahova County, encompassing 838.0 ha of mountainous forest.

Este artigo analisa a evolução dos indicadores de Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação para os Estados da Amazônia Legal no período entre 2000 e 2007, a luz do Sistema Regionais de Inovação, pois caracteriza-se como uma ferramenta teórica que permite compreender os processos de criação, uso e difusão do conhecimento e procura evidenciar o processo de inovação, a importância da interação entre instituições de pesquisa e empresas. A metodologia utilizada para o cálculo dos Índices refere-se ao Technology Achievement Index (TAI) elaborado pelo United Nations Development Programme – UNDP, e divulgado no Relatório de Desenvolvimento Humano de 2001, que se tornou uma referência metodológica para a elaboração de índices dessa natureza. Como evidência empírica mais significativa, observou-se a fraca evolução dos índices de CT & I, no período analisado, para os estados da Amazônia Legal, a exceção do estado do Amazonas, que no índice geral apresentou a melhor posição relativa.Palavras-Chave: Índic...

The objective of this paper is to analyse the external shock caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on public spending cap policy. The Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) was applied to map political actors and to verify if their policy core beliefs had changed with the external shock of the Covid-19 pandemic. The collection of data relied on documentary analysis of official documents and academic texts, as well as news and articles published in four Brazilian communication outlets. The analysis indicated that the resulting external shock was insufficient to significantly affect the policy core beliefs of the existing coalitions around fiscal policy in Brazil. This is also the conclusion we reached when contrasting the Brazilian case with the European Union's fiscal consolidation measures in the same period.

This communication aimed to: (i) define and map the global and local cores (Portugal and Brazil) invaded by Acacia longifolia; (ii) identify its impacts on coastal ecosystems; (iii) understand the relationships between the patterns and processes responsible for the proliferation and invasion of this species; (iv) and, finally, this information pretend to be a support to the future evaluation of the distribution patterns and ecological processes of the species to develop national and transnational Invasive Alien Species management. Acacia longifolia is a coastal shrub native to Australia, and shows significant invasive potential. It was introduced first in Portugal at the end of the 19th century, about a century before it was brought to Brazil. We did a global analysis of the invasive species dynamics (regarding its invasibility/invasiveness), focusing on areas invaded by the species with different natural and socio-ecological characteristics. Considering that total eradication in the short-medium term is technically unfeasible, more pragmatic management solutions are required whose adaptation to local realities greatly benefits from these global analyses.

For decades, the public forests of the Pacific Northwest were subject to widespread clearcutting of its old-growth trees as part of a federal policy promoting industrial logging. That era came to end in the early 1990s, due to court injunctions enforcing environmental laws like the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Forest Management Act, a response to diminishing old-growth dependent species like the northern spotted owl. Fulfilling a campaign promise to resolve the contentious issue by protecting both wildlife habitat and a logging industry important to local communities, President Clinton and his administration conducted a remarkable 1993 symposium on the economics and science of preserving rapidly disappearing habitat for ESA-listed species like the northern spotted owl and several salmonids. The result was the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan (NFP), widely recognized as the largest commitment to ecosystem management worldwide. Somewhat surprisingly, the NFP is still in effect over a quarter-century later, despite determined efforts to eviscerate it. This article examines the NFP, its antecedents, provisions, court interpretations, and future. In many respects, despite persistent controversy over the legal underpinnings of the NFP, the plan has provided substantial protection for Northwest's public forests, andalthough it did not end all public timber harvestslargely ended harvesting of public old-growth forests. Moreover, the plan's aquatic protection strategy has proved quite effective and worthy of emulation elsewhere. Although the Bush administration's repeated efforts to terminate the plan failed, the Obama administration removed about ten percent of the federal forests subject to the plan from its reach, substantially undermining its ecological premises. The courts have so far sustained these removals, casting a pall of uncertainty over efforts to update the NFP to reflect current challenges posed by wildfires and climate change. This article suggests that the goals of a revised NFP should be linked to the role that federal public Pacific Northwest forests can play in the United States' international obligations to combat climate change. We recommend a number of changes to the NFP, including ending both post-fire salvage sales and the logging of mature and old-growth forests. To accommodate these changes, we suggest providing a "just transition" for affected rural communities and increased flexibility concerning the boundaries of protective terrestrial reserves in the southern reaches of the plan. We maintain that despite lingering uncertainty about its scope of coverage, the NFP can continue to provide the signature example of landscape planning worldwide.

A comparison between the most relevant forest-focused and forest-related EU policies from the time periods of the three EU forest(ry) strategies of 1998, 2013 and 2021 has revealed an overall rise in the number of forest-related policies that is mainly rooted in the environmental policy sector. Next to the increasing number of policies, a growing preference for regulations over directives as policy instruments was identified. New policy fields that have gained increasing importance over the last 25 years, most prominently climate, energy and bioeconomy policy, create and define additional demands on forests through their cross-cutting relations with other policy sectors. At the same time, multi-issue strategies that have recently been employed by the European Commission might turn out to be unable to solve the trade-offs that are produced by opposing policy goals.

Post-conflict peacebuilding remains a critical challenge in the 21st century, particularly in fragile states emerging from civil war or protracted political violence. This paper explores the interplay between transitional justice mechanisms and inclusive political processes in sustaining long-term peace. Drawing upon historical and contemporary cases prior to 2023, the study synthesizes empirical findings and presents a framework emphasizing reconciliation, accountability, and inclusive governance. Quantitative analysis and visualization demonstrate a significant correlation between transitional justice mechanisms and decreased risk of conflict recurrence. Recommendations are proposed for policymakers, emphasizing hybrid justice models and participatory institutional reforms.

Reform in the forest sector in Peru resulted in a new forestry law, developed with substantial input from international conservation and donor organizations. While it incorporates the principles of sustainable forest management, biodiversity conservation and livelihood improvement, inconsistencies remain between the regulatory mechanisms and actual practices and outcomes in the field, leading some to consider the legal framework a failure. This article suggests that problems in the sector persist because the legal and regulatory frameworks do not incorporate existing local institutions, norms and practices -all of which are rooted in complex historical social, political and economic relationships. Based on information from interviews, data on movement of timber and analysis of secondary information, the authors examine the local structure, actors and dynamics of the concession forestry system in the Peruvian Amazon. The article focuses on how financial, social and political relationships in the network of actors, and particularly the patronage system, have helped actors in the sector adapt to the new policy framework. It is proposed that any further reform in the forest sector must be based on a keen understanding and appreciation of the praxis of timber extraction in the region. This research was supported by two Tinker Foundation grants to the two authors and by the Peru Fulbright Commission to Robin Sears while at Columbia University. Field research involved many interviews with loggers, resource owners and woodsmen in the field, and with officials in local, regional and national agencies. We acknowledge their willingness to share sometimes sensitive information. We gratefully acknowledge the input to and review of the manuscript by Christine Padoch and Louis Putzel, and the comments from three anonymous reviewers.

The ongoing degradation of the global environment presents unprecedented challenges to biodiversity conservation. Amidst rising threats such as habitat destruction, climate change, pollution, and over-exploitation, biodiversity laws and policies are often ill-equipped to address the scale and complexity of these issues. This paper examines the legal frameworks and policy measures aimed at protecting biodiversity, focusing on the challenges they face in the 2023 context. It evaluates the existing international conventions, national regulations, and local policies that attempt to safeguard biodiversity, alongside their limitations in responding to the rapid pace of environmental degradation. Recommendations are made to strengthen legal instruments and improve policy enforcement, drawing from existing research and the global push for sustainability.

Deforestation remains one of the most pressing environmental challenges of our time. Forest policies aimed at controlling and reducing deforestation have been enacted across the globe, but their effectiveness remains a subject of debate. This paper investigates the relationship between forest policy implementation and deforestation trends, focusing on policy effectiveness. By reviewing historical and contemporary studies, the paper seeks to understand how different policies have shaped deforestation trends and identifies gaps and future directions for improving forest governance at the global level. The discussion also highlights the complexities of policy effectiveness in the face of global economic pressures, local community interests, and environmental dynamics.

The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) label is one of the most widely accepted standards aimed at assessing longterm sustainable forest management worldwide. Through audits, accredited certification bodies assess the level of conformity of a firm's performance against the standard to grant or not the certificate on behalf of the FSC. In this paper, we assess the scope auditors have to shape the implementation of the FSC standard in Brazil. Our work is based on the analysis of certification bodies' rules and of available public full assessment and annual audit reports covering the period 2009-2013, completed with interviews with key informants. We show that most indicators of the Brazilian FSC standard leave no scope for interpretation. However, firms are certified and re-certified with a significant number of minor non-conformance with social, legal and environmental indicators. Moreover, the gradual improvement of the performance of the firm cannot always be considered as final. We conclude that some indicators are too broad and need to be clarified, that the FSC should limit the number of minor non-conformance issues allowed and prohibit their recurrence. More systematic surveys could narrow possible interpretations by auditors and certification bodies.

Transparent and participatory decision making in solving complex forest management problems are fostered by numerous forest policies. Thus, all relevant stakeholders should be involved in the process of evaluating forest road options from the early stages of planning. However, participatory tools are not yet used as a matter of course in the Romanian forest sector. This study aimed to stress the importance of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in decision making in the forest sector. A survey (n=27) was conducted for prioritizing stakeholders' preferences on criteria and sub-criteria used in the assessment of forest road options. ANOVA and post-hoc tests were performed for analysing the statistical significance of responses and possible patterns of stakeholders' behaviour. Accessibility for performing forest works, protection of ecologically important areas and road construction costs were identified as the most relevant evaluation sub-criteria. The results showed stakeholders are aware of the environmental impacts of forest roads, while they show yet little concern for risks of accidents and other social factors. In respect to certain criteria, a tendency of homogenous clustering of expertise groups' opinions was noted, the groups with forestry backgrounds behaving differently than those with environmental or tourism backgrounds. The outcomes of this study are useful for practitioners willing to approach complex decision problems like forest road network planning or selection of timber harvesting systems from a multidimensional perspective.

The paper presents the research results on conflicts in the forestry sector. The theoretical framework of the research is based on the belief that conflicts are a universal phenomenon. The basic constituents of conflicts are elements and aspects. The elements of conflicts are the substance, processes and relations between participants, which affect the social, cultural, institutional and economic aspects. They also include the aspect of natural resources, which is a feature of the forestry sector. Such a theoretical framework gave grounds for the analysis of employees' opinions about the type and significance and the stage in which the observed conflicts were. The opinions of the people employed in enterprises and organizations benefiting from state forests, protected areas and administrative state bodies in the forestry sector were collected through a survey. The data collected were processed using descriptive statistics. A lot of conflicting situations were identified and they were classified into 10 groups. The most serious one is the conflict between regular measures and works in the forest of nature protection. Nine participants were identified in these conflicts. It was found that some conflicts had been resolved, while some were in the latent phase, with the possibility to escalate.

Global increases in intensive forestry have raised concerns about forest plantation effects on water, but few studies have tested the effects of plantation forest removal and native forest restoration on catchment hydrology. We describe results of a 14‐year paired watershed experiment on ecological restoration in south central Chile which documents streamflow response to the early stages of native forest restoration, after clearcutting of plantations of exotic fast‐growing Eucalyptus, planting of native trees, and fostering natural regeneration of native temperate rainforest species. Precipitation, streamflow, and vegetation were measured starting in 2006 in four small (3 to 5 ha) catchments with Eucalyptus globulus plantations and native riparian buffers in the Valdivian Coastal Reserve. Mean annual precipitation is 2500 mm, of which 11% occurs in summer. Streamflow increased, and increases persisted, throughout the first 9 years of vigorous native forest regeneration (2011 to 2019...

Since their widespread introduction in the 1980s, large-scale tree plantations have seen contestations over their socio-economic impacts. With the establishment of new plantations on the rise, a review of the literature examining their impacts on local communities is needed to inform policies and practices. In this systematic review, we followed an a priori protocol to reduce the selection biases inherent to conventional literature reviews, and considered both grey and peer-reviewed literature. Of the 20,450 studies identified in our literature search, only 92 studies met our predefined inclusion criteria. However, only 22 studies presented a clear comparator and considered confounding factors in their analysis. Of the 251 impacts identified in this sample, most impacts across the nine categories were characterised as predominantly negative impacts attributed to large-scale tree plantations. Impacts on employment (22% of reported impacts/of which 41% predominantly negative), land (21%/81%), livelihoods (12%/48%) and the often intertwined social impacts (20%/69%) were the most commonly considered categories, within which a majority of studies agreed on the impact dynamics when in similar contexts, resembling the dynamics observed in other large-scale land-based investments. Most impacts were reported from Southeast Asia (34% of reported impacts), South America (29%), Africa (23%) and Australasia (12%). We corroborate that costs of large-scale tree plantations for residents tend to be front-loaded, especially when plantations have displaced customary land uses, and possible benefits to accrue over time, moderated by the emergence of local processing and complementary livelihood activities. However, given the methodological inconsistencies in our sample and the under-representation of areas known to have undergone plantation development, strong global evidence on the long-term socio-economic impacts of large-scale tree plantations remains limited.

Fuelwood is an important source of domestic energy in rural regions of Brazil.  In the Zona da Mata of Minas Gerais, native species from the Atlantic Forest are an important source of fuelwood, supplemented by wood from eucalyptus and coffee plantations. The use of native species is complicated by their increasing scarcity and the recent enforcement of forest policies that prohibit the felling of even dead natives trees without a permit. In this study, the factors contributing to the persistent use of fuelwood in this region, despite the simultaneous use of liquid petroleum gas in most households, are explored by examining fuelwood use patterns in four small rural communities in the Zona da Mata Mineira using household surveys and semi-structured interviews.
Two hypotheses were tested using a Jacknife regression.  One hypothesis, based on the Energy Ladder model, tested the predictive power of socioeconomic status in relation to fuelwood use.  This variable was not shown to explain a statistically significant percentage of the variance in fuelwood use.  The second hypothesis tested for a moderating effect of access to fuelwood on the relationship between the socioeconomic status of a household and that amount of time that household spends collecting fuelwood. The interaction between access to fuelwood and socioeconomic status was shown to explain a significant percentage of the variance in fuelwood use, thereby indicating that in this region, the effect of socioeconomic status on fuelwood use depends on access to fuelwood.
The Atlantic Forest Policy was found to have little influence on domestic energy decisions made by surveyed households.  Few research subjects had a good understanding of the basic tenets of this policy and the Forest Police do not have adequate resources to enforce the policy at this level.

The arecanut-based mixed cropping system is a traditional and sustainable agricultural practice adopted in Mizoram due to its ecological and economic benefits. This paper investigates the performance and determinants of arecanut-based mixed cropping systems through a field-based investigation in Mizoram. Data were collected from 300 farmers across two districts (Kolasib and Mamit) in four villages; Bilkhawthlir, Vairengte, Kawrthah and Zamuang, focusing on crop combinations, yield, income, and labour efficiency.