Sustainable use of Tropical Forests in Asia

Abstract

Recent surveys of tropical deforestation indicate acceleration during the eighties from 11.4 million ha to 17.2 million ha annually. FAO [1990] estimates conversion of primary tropical forest to degraded forest or other land at 170,000 km2 yearly, almost double FAO’s estimate of a decade earlier. There is now general agreement that somewhat over one percent of residual tropical forest is converted each year, and that if present rates are maintained, there will be little more than isolated patches, themselves probably not sustainable, by the end of the next century.

This chapter draws in part on a keynote address by Peter Ashton delivered to the conference on Conservation Biology in Australia and Oceania, held at the University of Queensland, September – October 1991 and on an invited paper, ‘Protecting Tropical Forests,’ by Theodore Panayotou, presented at the American Economics Association Meeting in New Orleans, January 3 – 6, 1992.