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Our research explores local perspectives of a recent and controversial shift in conservation and development strategies in the Brazilian Amazon whereby legal timber commercialization is being pioneered in select extractive reserves, which are a type of comanaged sustainable-use protected area. To understand how this initiative might affect well-being, we documented perceptions of reserve residents about a legal logging project and factors that influenced their decision to participate or not participate. Semistructured interviews (N = 64) were conducted with both male and female heads of household from June to August 2014. We tested the effect of household-level livelihood assets associated with material and relational well-being on project participation. Participating households were significantly less economically well-off and were more educated than nonparticipating households. Individual perceptions indicated that project supporters were motivated by income, whereas nonsupporters most frequently criticized the low price of timber. Both groups expressed concern about the potential environmental impacts of logging. By gender, supportive men were more motivated by financial aspects, whereas supportive women pointed to improved physical assets. Men opposed to the logging project highlighted governance issues, whereas nonsupportive women tended to express environmental concerns. Our study corroborates previously documented interests (and needs) of residents to develop alternative income-generating livelihood opportunities. Further, most interviewed residents expressed support for a more locally customized logging project, indicating that a lack of resident inclusion in project development generated much of the project controversy. Our study highlights both economic development and comanagement governance challenges of sustainable-use protected areas and how project interventions relate to well-being of forest residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In much of the Amazon Basin, approximately 70% of the population lives in urban areas and urbanward migration continues. Based on data collected over more than a decade in two long-settled regions of Amazonia, we find that rural-urban migration in the region is an extended and complex process. Like recent rural-urban migrants worldwide, Amazonian migrants, although they may be counted as urban residents, are often not absent from rural areas but remain members of multi-sited households and continue to participate in rural-urban networks and in rural land-use decisions. Our research indicates that, despite their general poverty, these migrants have affected urban markets for both food and construction materials. We present two cases: that of açaí palm fruit in the estuary of the Amazon and of cheap construction timbers in the Peruvian Amazon. We find that many new Amazonian rural-urban migrants have maintained some important rural patterns of both consumption and knowledge. Through their consumer behavior, they are affecting the areal extent of forests; in the two floodplain regions discussed, tree cover is increasing. We also find changes in forest composition, reflecting the persistence of rural consumption patterns in cities resulting in increased demand for and production of açaí and cheap timber species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tropical deforestation is leading to a loss of economically productive timber concessions, as well as areas with important environmental or socio-cultural values. To counteract this threat in Southeast Asia, sustainable forest management (SFM) practices are becoming increasingly important. We assess the tools and guidelines that have been developed to promote SFM and the progress that has been made in Southeast Asia toward better logging practices. We specifically focus on practices relevant to biodiversity issues. Various regional or national mechanisms now inform governments and the timber industry about methods to reduce the impact of production forestry on wildlife and the forest environment. However, so many guidelines have been produced that it has become difficult to judge which ones are most relevant. In addition, most guidelines are phrased in general terms and lack specific recommendations targeted to local conditions. These might be reasons for the generally slow adoption of SFM practices in the region, with only a few countries having incorporated the guidelines into national legislation. Malaysia, Indonesia, and Laos are among the frontrunners in this process. Overall there is progress, especially in the application of certification programs, the planning and management of high conservation value forests, the regulation and control of hunting, and silvicultural management. To reduce further forest loss, there is a need to accelerate the implementation of good forest management practices. We recommend specific roles for governments, the forestry industry, and nongovernmental organizations in further promoting the implementation of SFM practices for biodiversity conservation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uncertainty is a dominant feature of decision making in forestry and wildlife management. Aggravating this challenge is the irreversibility of some decisions, resulting in the loss of economic opportunities or the extirpation of wildlife populations. We adapted the real options approach from economic theory to develop a methodology to evaluate a resource management decision to stop timber harvesting when a woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus caribou) population becomes threatened with extinction. In our study area of central Labrador, Canada, both caribou and timber harvesting are valued ecosystem services. By using a decision rule, which incorporates future developments, the real options approach provides a technique to incorporate ecological and social uncertainty into forest-management decision making. As a result, it reduces the risk of a forest manager making a decision with unwanted irreversible consequences or failing to make a decision that could avoid such unwanted consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on forest management in Nepal. Organized forest management on a large scale began in Nepal around 1880, with establishment of forest inspection offices and timber offices throughout the country. The first significant step toward adopting community forestry approaches was taken during the Ninth Forestry Conference, held in Kathmandu in 1974. The National Forest Act of 1976, and its subsequent amendments of 1977 and 1978, attempted to return some degree of ownership and control over forest resources to the people through Panchayat forestry.