A world vision about scientific and technical papers among non-timber forest products in the last two decade

Abstract

The interest for non timber forest products (NTFPs) has been growing over the years. These products, that are part of livelihood and income sources, are produced by thousands of traditional population living in or around forests. The vast majority of these products are explored in a predatory manner, without regard to environmental and ecological aspects. Therefore, it aim of this study was to make a literature review of scientific articles published in national and international journals about NTFPs that have been published in the past two decades with the goal of characterizing the current scenario, as well the types of products and methodologies that are being employed for study NTFP’s. A total of 218 articles published between 1990 and 2011 were reviewed. The fields of study span countries mostly belonging to Asia, Africa and South America. There are few studies on the understanding of the species life cycle and improvement of its productivity. Most of researches focus on the economic characteristics and how the management of the NTFPs are occurring, always with respect to the species most exploited for traditional populations.