Tropical Forests Conference

UFIC is proud to support the international Tropical Forests Conference in February 2002. Tropical forests sustain a wealth of biodiversity, provide a wide range of ecosystem services and products, and support livelihoods for millions of people. Tropical forest conservation is highly complex, not only because these forests perform so many different functions, but also because of the variety of stakeholders involved. Since less than ten percent of the world's tropical forests are likely to be preserved as legally protected areas, conservation of the remaining ninety percent will depend on the ability of stakeholders to make the products and services these "working forests" provide appear competitive with alternative land use options. This conference was conceived as a vehicle for identifying opportunities to make that happen, and obstacles that successful efforts will need to avoid or overcome.

Four sessions have been organized, each focused on an area of great and growing interest. Distinguished speakers have been invited to participate in each of those sessions, and submitted papers will also be welcome:

1. Linking Communities and Markets: Critical Issues (moderator, M. Schmink)

This session will focus on the commercialization of community forestry. Issues to be addressed include: the impact of forest management activities on socioeconomic systems, distribution of costs and benefits of forest management, appropriate institutions and policies to support SFM, adaptive management approaches, and the technical and managerial capacity of communities.

2. Paying for Carbon: Internalizing an Ecosystem Service in Tropical Forestry (moderator, J. Alivalapati)

This session will focus on the potential role of the emerging carbon marketplace as a clean development mechanism (CDM) promoting tropical forest conservation and management. Issues to be addressed include:

What accounting mechanisms are appropriate if land use, land use change, and forestry activities in developing countries can generate emission credits?
How will accounts deal with the issues of permanence, leakage, uncertainty and verifiability?
Will paying for carbon help tropical forest conservation?

3. Chainsaw Conservation: Sacrificing Trees for the Sake of the Forest (moderator, J. Putz)

The secondary effects of tropical forest logging (e.g., increased hunting, fires, and likelihood of forest conversion) are generally worse than those impacts directly due to tree felling and other silvicutural treatments, but recent research efforts have focused more on how to reduce direct impacts than on how to prevent the secondary effects. With an emphasis on the most serious community and landscape-level consequences of logging in tropical forests, this session will focus on the conditions that must be met for the goals of conservation to be realized by chainsaw-wielding foresters.

4. Certification of Tropical Forest Products and Management Systems (moderator, J. Dickinson)

This session will focus on forest certification as a conservation strategy. Issues to be addressed include:

The practice of certified forestry - costs and benefits; role of government in setting the legal framework; regeneration of ecologically and economically viable forests.
Certified products and the market - market dynamics; lesser known species utilization; support from environmental community; support from retailers; community and private sector participation in the market.
Environmental and social benefits - expectations and realities; implications for wildlife and biodiversity; participation of communities.

In addition to the oral sessions, there will also be a poster session open to submissions on any aspect of tropical forest ecology, management and policy. A keynote address will be given by Dr. Ariel Lugo, Director of the USFS International Institute of Tropical Forestry.