Introduction

Threats to the world's forests are evoking responses at all levels, from villagers organizing to protect their woods to international summit meetings of world leaders. Many articles, books, and films have been produced documenting forest losses and the many threats – from peasant farmers, fuelgatherers, ranchers, herders, large-scale development projects, multinational companies, and atmospheric pollution. This book is different. It reports the results of an international research project that identified the impacts that governments, most of which are committed in principle to conservation and wise resource use, are themselves having on the forests under their stewardship through policies that inadvertently or intentionally aggravate the losses.

Such policies, by and large, were adopted for worthy objectives: industrial or agricultural growth, regional development, job creation, or poverty alleviation. But the study's important finding is that such objectives typically have not been realized, or have been attained only at excessive cost. The government policies identified in this book, both those usually identified as forestry policies and those impinging on the forestry sector from outside, have resulted in economic and fiscal losses while contributing to the depletion of forest resources.

Forestry policies, the terms on which potential users can exploit public forests, include harvesting fees, royalties, logging regulations, and administration of timber concessions with private loggers. Governments have typically sold off timber too cheaply, sacrificing public revenues and the undervalued non-timber benefits of the standing forest while encouraging rapid logging exploitation. The terms of many timber concession agreements and revenue systems have encouraged wasteful, resourcedepleting logging.