Abstract
Selective logging is pervasive across the tropics and a key driver of forest degradation. Two competing harvest management strategies have been proposed: Land sharing via low-intensity logging throughout a concession; and high-intensity land-sparing logging across a smaller area, protecting part of the concession as primary forest. Empirical research points to land sparing being more optimal for maintaining biodiversity and carbon, especially under secure land tenure, but a key question for forest-based economies is how each strategy affects the profitability of logging. We combine detailed financial data with harvest simulations to assess the profitability of land-sharing and land-sparing logging in the Brazilian Amazon. Under business-as-usual, land-sharing is significantly more profitable than land-sparing logging, whether sparing is conducted in a single block or targeting the highest-density timber stocks, highlighting a conflict between economic and conservation priorities. Land-sharing logging is also more profitable than hybrid strategies whereby a mix of land-sharing and land-sparing logging is employed. Conservation-based restrictions that apply quotas on species in different size classes reduces the opportunity cost of land sparing, but even under tight restrictions land sharing remains more profitable and land sparing often returns a loss. Additional financial incentives, including timber certification schemes and carbon-based payment for ecosystem services, are needed to bridge the opportunity cost of land-sparing logging and minimise ecological damage to tropical rainforests.
Highlights
Over 403 million hectares of tropical forest are committed to selective logging [1], with the expansion of logging set to continue to meet increasing demand from growing populations, increased urbanisation, and consumerism [2, 3]
As the most powerful force of tropical forest degradation [6, 7], selective logging is responsible for 6% of tropical greenhouse gas emissions [8] and reductions in forest-interior biodiversity [9, 10]
Lowintensity timber extraction is implemented throughout the entire forest concession, whereas under land sparing, smaller areas of a concession are harvested at high intensity allowing the remainder to be protected as unlogged forest
Summary
Over 403 million hectares of tropical forest are committed to selective logging [1], with the expansion of logging set to continue to meet increasing demand from growing populations, increased urbanisation, and consumerism [2, 3]. Lowintensity timber extraction is implemented throughout the entire forest concession, whereas under land sparing, smaller areas of a concession are harvested at high intensity allowing the remainder to be protected as unlogged forest. In Borneo, more bird, dung beetle and ant species have higher abundance under land-sparing regimes [17], while in the Amazon, a mixed strategy would benefit understorey butterflies [19] and high sensitivity of dung beetles to even lowintensity logging suggests that land-sparing logging would be beneficial [20]. Pan-tropical modelling suggests that land sparing would benefit both biodiversity and forest carbon under secure land tenure scenarios [21]. It has been suggested that better conservation outcomes can instead be achieved through focusing on improved logging management strategies (e.g. RIL) [22], or that mixed strategies can better achieve all forest stakeholder objectives [23]
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