There is more to sustainable forest management than reduced impact logging. Partnerships between multiple actors are needed in order to create the institutional context for good forest governance and sustainable forest management and stimulate the necessary local community involvement. The idea behind this is that the parties would be able to achieve more jointly than on their own by combining assets, knowledge, skills and political power of actors at different levels of scale. This article aims to demonstrate by example the nature and variety of forest-related partnerships in Brazilian Amazonia. Based on the lessons learned from these cases and the authors’ experience, the principal characteristics of successful partnerships are described, with a focus on political and socioeconomic aspects. These characteristics include fairly negotiated partnership objectives, the active involvement of the public sector as well as impartial brokers, equitable and cost-effective institutional arrangements, sufficient and equitably shared benefits for all the parties involved, addressing socioeconomic drawbacks, and taking measures to maintain sustainable exploitation levels.
Until the 1980s, deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon had largely been the result of public policies (incentives, investment). Since the 1990s, with basic infrastructure installed and cattle-ranching turned profitable due to innovations, deforestation has relied on its own endogenous dynamics. To stop this trend, politics will have to use both traditional and modern instruments for influencing economic behaviour, that is, control and sanctions as well as dialogue and negotiation. Since democratisation, civil society organisations (CSOs) have grown in the Amazon region, often with important support from foreign non-governmental organisations. Today, they are important partners for sustainable, bottom-up development strategies. This has become evident in the political mobilisation against two large public infrastructure investment projects: the dam and hydroelectric plant of Belo Monte; and the paving of the federal highway BR-163 between Cuiabá and Santarém.
The part played by the Brazilian tropical timber industry in deforesting the Amazon region has not been studied very much. This book describes the expansion of the timber industry in the Brazilian federal state of Para since the 1960s, when Amazon development became an important item on the government's agenda.
This report evaluates the progress achieved in forest management by indigenous people and local communities, which was set as a key objective at the 1992 Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It presents new findings and identifies what needs to done to protect global forest areas and ensure their contributions to social, environmental and economic development.
The paper argues that the amount of forests recognised as owned or controlled by indigenous peoples and local communities has increased globally from 10 per cent in 2002 to 15 per cent in 2012; in developing countries the increase has been from 21 to 31 per cent. It observes that the majority of governments continue to resist large-scale recognition of community land rights and many deny that indigenous peoples have any claim to their customary lands. Citing examples from Africa and Asia, the paper shows that no new areas of community rights have been recognised in the last several years.
This guide provides a strategic overview on how to best renew the commitment to forests at a time when deforestation and degradation are still rampant. It also presents potential solutions to address business as usual (BAU) as it relates to a viable and more promising future. The intention of this guide is to:
- Emphasize the economic and human benefits surrounding ecosystem goods and services and biodiversity conservation;
- Explore opportunities for forest transformation that are presently available; and
- Increase awareness and coverage of these issues.