Forest Concessions Research Articles

Estimation of Total Carbon Stocks in Soil and Vegetation of Tropical Peat Forest in Indonesia

The study was conducted in the forest concession area of PT. Diamond Raya Timber, Riau Province, Indonesia. Measurement and calculation carbon stocks in soil and vegetation of tropical peat forest should be done accurately to anticipate carbon trading. The objective of the study is to estimate carbon stocks in soil and vegetation in 4 forest conditions. The study found that biomass and carbon stocks in the soil was 8 times higher than in the vegetation in primary forest condition, and 10 times in logged over forest and secondary forest condition. Carbon stocks in vegetation and soil were 189.45 ton C ha -1 and 1537.37 ton C ha -1 in primary forest, 161.76 ton C ha -1 , and 1713.77 ton C ha -1 in logged over area, 139.05 ton C ha -1 and 1486.39 ton C ha -1 in secondary forest, and 43.09 ton C ha -1 and 1205.59 ton C ha -1 in degraded forest. Allocation of carbon stocks in the standing trees in primary forest, logged over area, secondary forest, and degraded forest were 70, 60, 62, and 7% respectively.

Governmental Forest Policy for Sustainable Forest Management in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Nicaragua: Regulation, Implementation, and Impact

We evaluated how governmental forest regulation in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Nicaragua has succeeded or failed in fostering changes in forest owner and user behavior that enhance the sustainability of tropical forest management. As expected, sufficient resources and capacity for forest policy implementation are crucial for attaining governmental forest policy objectives, but innovative arrangements for promoting, enforcing, and verifying policy compliance can compensate for limited regulatory resources and processes. The findings also indicate that: the level of governmental commitment to sustainable forest management (SFM) was as important as total funding levels; a mix of government rules and incentives enhanced adoption of SFM; the incorporation of professional forest regents offset limited agency capacity; and forest certification enhanced SFM on forest concessions. Local level inducements and constraints that enhance or impede governmental forest policy adoption and compliance also were identified.

Towards more equitable terms of cooperation: local people's contribution to commercial timber concessions

The mixed outcomes of seemingly well-intentioned partnerships that try to create mutually beneficial agreements between local communities and private firms remain a puzzle. This study looks for answers to this puzzle by reviewing a large number of empirical studies in a wide variety of contexts. The kinds of local skills and expertise that are important for good timber concession management, how local people and concession managers can construct mutually profitable relationships, the most effective strategies used by communities to defend their claims in conflicts with private firms, and the types of public policies that are supportive of more equitable terms of cooperation in forest concession management are issues that were examined in the review. Institutional arrangements that regulate the relationship between local communities and forest concessionaires, and particularly the distribution of de jure property rights, help explain the mixed results. Less conclusive evidence exists with regards to community perspectives on concession-community relationships. The study concludes by suggesting future directions for research and discusses the implications of the findings for public policy.

Presence and Purpose of Nonindigenous Peoples on Indigenous Lands: A Descriptive Account from the Bolivian Lowlands

Integration into the market economy changes indigenous people's use of land and resources. We study one pathway leading to integration of indigenous peoples to the market economy: the entrance of nonindigenous peoples into lands inhabited by indigenous populations. We analyzed data from a survey (n = 779) in 87 Tsimane’ villages, an Amazonian society. We assessed the entrance of traders, loggers, cattle ranchers, highland colonist farmers, and other nonindigenous peoples in villages settled in parks, forest concessions, indigenous territories, and private lands. Interactions were generally frequent, friendly, and had an economic basis. The Tsimane’ expressed hostility to the entrance of highland colonist farmers. The entrance of nonindigenous peoples was associated with unregulated natural resource extraction. If conservationists want to gain the allegiance of Tsimane’ on conservation efforts, they will have to present them with a better alternative than the current economic benefits generated by the presence of nonindigenous peoples on their lands.

Climate Change Mitigation Through Reduced-Impact Logging and the Hierarchy of Production Forest Management

The proposed hierarchy of production forest management provides modus operandi for forest concessions to move incrementally towards Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) via Reduced-Impact Logging (RIL) and forest certification. Financial benefits are sourced in the “Additionality Zone”, financing the rise in the hierarchy and offsetting prohibitive forest and carbon certification costs. RIL carbon registration components consist of developing credible baseline, additionality and leakage arguments around the business-as-usual scenario through the quantification of historical forest inventory and production records, forest infrastructure records and damage to the residual forest. If conventional harvesting is taken as a baseline, research indicates RIL can potentially reduce emissions by approximately 1–7 tCO2e ha−1yr−1. The current market price of USD $7.30 per tCO2e may result in over USD $50 ha−1yr−1 in additional revenue, well above the estimated USD $3–5 ha−1 in carbon transaction costs. Concessions in Sabah Malaysia demonstrate the financial viability of long-term RIL and certification planning. This may act as a basis for future planned forest management activities involving RIL, carbon and forest certification through the hierarchy of production forest management.

Fragmenting forests: the double edge of effective forest monitoring

► More effective forest monitoring can lead to denser road networks and greater forest fragmentation. ► Random spot monitoring of logging sites requires a threshold investment to be effective. ► Checkpoint monitoring of logging sites gives a more continuous return to invested effort. ► A need exists for empirical research on road building, monitoring effectiveness, and monitoring costs. The link between ineffective forest monitoring and forest degradation is well known. Under REDD+, monitoring stands to become more important as a means of maintaining incentive. Little attention however has been paid to the possible adverse consequences of forest monitoring. Our research develops a spatially explicit, agent-based model (ABM) of timber extraction in a Congo Basin forest concession to investigate the potential conservation impact of more effective monitoring. We modeled the building of access roads, and logging of legal timber and illegal timber, where illegal timber may be interpreted broadly to include prohibited species, smaller trees, or trees in areas where cutting is not permitted. We investigated road building under (1) random spot monitoring of logging sites and (2) monitoring of logged trunks at checkpoints. Our findings indicate that although more effective monitoring can reduce illegal harvesting, it can also lead to construction of denser road networks and higher levels of forest fragmentation, with an implied loss of biodiversity. These insights are particularly relevant in the context of REDD+, as they suggest that some monitoring strategies may lead to more forest fragmentation, even as they help reduce emissions.

Use of DNA fingerprints to control the origin of sapelli timber (Entandrophragma cylindricum) at the forest concession level in Cameroon

Illegal logging and associated trade are the cause of many economic and ecological problems both in producer and in consumer countries. There are an increasing number of national and international regulations in place that call for efficient timber tracking systems. We present results of a pilot study of a DNA-based method to control the geographical origin of timber in forest concessions in Cameroon. We addressed genetic differentiation at five nuclear microsatellite loci in seven sapelli (Entandrophragma cylindricum, Meliaceae) populations located in three forest concessions in Eastern Cameroon. In the framework of a blind test, seven anonymous timber sample sets were analysed at three microsatellite loci and compared to the genetic reference data of the forest concessions in Cameroon. Our results show that genetic differentiation was low within and among concessions. Combining the results of Bayesian genetic assignment method and exclusion test, we could determine that the timber stemmed or did not stem from the focus forest concession in six out of the seven blind sample sets. We further discuss the accuracy of the presented method and draw conclusions for a better sampling and genotyping strategy. Our work provides clear evidence that the use of genetic fingerprints is a useful tool to fight against illegal logging.

Forest resources and forestry in Indonesia

Forests serve as a dwelling place and source of livelihood for the people of Indonesia. This paper analyzed the forest resources and forestry in Indonesia. The forest area in Indonesia amounts to 137,090,468.18 ha consisting of 133,694,685.18 ha as terrestrial forest area and 3,395,783 ha as water area. Hard work by the Ministry of Forestry has succeeded in suppressing the average rate of forest degradation. For the purpose of enlarging the log production from natural production forest through the silvicultural system of TPTI (Indonesian Planting and Selection Cutting), an Intensive Silvicultural System has been introduced at 25 forest concessions with the total area of about 52,300 ha. On the other hand, owing to its geographical position in the Equator region between the Asian and Australian continents, Indonesian tropical forest possesses high biodiversity. Finally, to guarantee the local community's active participation in the sustainable forest management practice, the government has empowered the local communities that live within and surrounding the forest area through various programs, such as establishing community forest, village forest, conservation forest, production center of non-wood forest products, community-based forest management and an improvement program with forest concession companies. The government also introduced the General Service Agency for financial support for communities that want to establish a forest plantation.

STUDI FLORISTIK DI KAWASAN PLASMA NUTIFAH UNTUK MENDUKUNG PENEPATAN PLOT KONSERVASI GENETIK TENGKAWANG (Shorea spp) DI KALIMANTAN BARAT

A research was done at natural tropical forest in forest concession of PT : Suka Jaya Makmur (SJM).Ketapang. West Kalimantan . The objective of the study is germplasm area in natural Forest. The aims of this floristic study were to investigate the potensial and distribution of tengkawang tree species. Tengkawang kernel is one of the fomous Non –Wood Forest Product (NWFP), it is rescources of on importance vegetable fat. The inventory was conducted using line plot method in each area of 26 Hectares. 130 sample plots were made up systematically within 13 line plot. The sample plot had a square shape with nested sampling area measured 20 mx 20 m for tree stage, 10 m x 10 m for pole stage, 5 m x 5 m for sapling stage and 2 m x 2 m for seeding stage. The result reveal that the germplasm consisted of 75 species were dominated by industralwood species . The germpalsm are was dominated by Shorea leprosula with importance value (31.01%). Eugenia cymosa (26.32%).Litsea Firma (18.11%) and Shorea laevis (16.02%) respectively . Some tengkawang trees were found in the study area with important value were varied were Shorea pinnanga (9.43%) . Shorea macrophylla (4.11%). Shorea macistopterix (0.63%) respectively but the famous of tengkawang tree (Shorea stenoptera)was not found in the study area. Therefore, block 35 & 36 PT SJM germplasm area unrepresentative for tengkawang genetic concervation plat.

Forest concessions in the Maya Biosphere Reserve, Guatemala: A decade later

In the Multiple-Use Zone of Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve, the usufruct rights to timber and non-timber forest resources were granted through concession agreements to 12 community organizations and two private timber companies in the late 1990s and early 2000s. After more than a decade, some concessions are successfully managing forests for multiple uses while others have had limited success or failed completely. This paper provides a management unit-based analysis and evaluation of the evolution of these forest concessions. First, we present a critical assessment of the current state of ecological integrity, socio-economic development, governance, and financing within each of the 14 forest concessions, using a series of quantitative and qualitative indicators. Next, we categorize the different trajectories that the concessions have experienced, and describe the key biophysical, socio-economic, and market events and drivers that may have influenced their outcomes. Lastly, we provide suggestions for the continued consolidation of multiple-use forest management practices in the Maya Biosphere Reserve, and draw out lessons for multiple-use forest management elsewhere in the tropics.

The sustainability of timber production from Eastern Amazonian forests

Although the regulations are imperfectly enforced, logging firms in the Brazilian Amazon are subject to forest management regulations intended to reduce environmental damage and protect future forest productivity. Additionally, voluntary best practices firms adopt to achieve environmental performance that exceed regulatory requirements are largely limited to reduced impact logging (RIL) systems that reduce harvest damage relative to conventional logging systems used by a large majority of firms in the region. Existing regulations combined with best practices may not be adequate to ensure sustained yields. This inadequacy is an important issue as Brazil implements an ambitious program of forest concessions on public lands. We analyze the profitability and environmental outcomes of best logging practices and proposed sustainability requirements. We propose two operational definitions of sustainability (the first focusing on sustaining stand-level timber volumes and the other focusing on sustaining species-level volumes within the stand) based on sustaining timber inventories across cutting cycles rather than on sustaining overall harvest yields. RIL is shown to be profitable for loggers and increase the timber available for future harvests. While volume predicted to be available for the second and third harvests are significantly lower than the available timber in the unlogged forest, the second and third harvests are projected to be profitable and have the potential for sustainability despite high opportunity costs. However, as harvesting is repeated into the future, results show the composition of the harvest shifts from higher-value shade-tolerant and emergent species toward a greater reliance on longer-lived, lower-value pioneer species. This shift may create pressure to expand the forest base under management in order to continue to supply high-value species or increase the risk of timber trespass in conservation units and areas under community or indigenous management.

PENERAPAN MULTISISTEM SILVIKULTUR PADA UNIT PENGELOLAAN HUTAN PRODUKSI : TINJAUAN ASPEK EKOLOGI

Forest is a renewable resources having various benefits including products, environmental services and beautifulness of landscape. Therefore, forest must be managed using sustainable based principle to produce sustainably the maximum benefit. Howevere, the practices of forest management by the companies of forest Concession have created the various qualities of Logged Over Area (LOA). According to the landscape point of view, LOA were composed of mosaics with various qualities of lands and stands having low productivity. Based on this fenomena, LOA had betters to manage by a silviculture multisystem incording with local biophysical properties. This silviculture system should be implemented to improve the land productivity through minimizing soil disturbances, maintaining the supply of soil organic matters and biodiversity. Beside woods and by forest products, emphirically forest ecosystem has an importan role in water preservation, CO 2 sequestration, and carbon storage. Keywords: Logged Over Area, Production Forest, Silviculture Multisystem

Corruption and forest concessions

We examine how corruption impacts a central government's application of concession policy instruments consisting of royalty rates, concession size, environmentally sensitive logging levels, and enforcement. Harvesters have incentives to illegally log by taking more volume than is allowed, high grading through removal of only the highest valued and best formed trees, and shirking environmentally sensitive logging requirements, all of which reduce public goods produced from native tropical forests. Corruption is introduced through logging inspectors who can be bribed by harvesters to avoid fines associated with illegal logging. Both the theory and a simulation are used to compare policy design under corruption and no corruption.

Multiple forest use through commercial sport hunting: Lessons from a community-based model from the Petén, Guatemala

The “Proyecto Pavo” is a project dedicated to the conservation of the Ocellated Turkey (Meleagris ocellata) through sustainable use of the species in multiple-use, community-managed forest concessions of the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Petén, Guatemala. Since 2000, the project has conducted selective turkey harvests, performed related research, and promoted the conservation benefits of managed sport hunting for this species. Field activities of the project feature providing high-quality Ocellated Turkey hunts to sport hunter clients. Participating concessions benefit directly from harvest revenues of a resource that was not previously exploited commercially and indirectly from affiliated project activities. The project began operations in a single concession on an experimental basis and evolved into a commercial enterprise operating in multiple concession units. The project has overcome numerous development and operational challenges, including compatibility issues with timber and NTFP extraction. Under proper circumstances, carefully designed sport hunting programs can offer profitable and sustainable forest product diversification alternatives that are highly compatible with tropical multiple-use management and forest conservation objectives.

A DNA Method to Verify the Integrity of Timber Supply Chains; Confirming the Legal Sourcing of Merbau Timber From Logging Concession to Sawmill

Abstract Several methods are employed by the timber industry to try to restrict the flow of products from illegal or unsustainable sources into timber supply chains. The most commonly applied are systems of log marking and associated documentation that accompany the logs. However this system is open to falsification, particularly between the logging concession and the timber mill, where the majority of illegally logged timber enters the supply chain. This paper describes the development of a methodology to track a unique genetic fingerprint for single logs of merbau, Intsia palembanica (Leguminosae), a high-value Indonesian timber species, from logging concession to the mill, where the DNA profile of individual logs is difficult or impossible to falsify. We find that whilst the ability to extract DNA and amplify a PCR product from logs decreases slightly between forest concession (59.2%) and mill (41.9%) samples, that overall enough samples worked across the 14 microsatellite markers to provide an exact genotype match between forest and sawmill samples for 27 out of 32 logs. Furthermore for these 27 samples, the probability that an illegal log with an exact genotype match to forest samples had been substituted was very low (less than 10-5) for 18 samples, was low (between 10-2 and 10-4) for 7 samples and was moderate (10-1) for 2 samples. Improvements to DNA extraction and amplification success are recommended to improve this protocol, and there was a negative correlation between locus size and amplification success but a positive correlation with allele number. However, overall we propose that this methodology is now suitable for broad-scale industry application to track legally harvested timber and check for illegal substitutions along supply chains.

Following the Rules: Brazilian Logging Concessions under Imperfect Enforcement and Royalties

Debates about forest concessions in the Brazilian Amazon have focused on the government's enforcement capacity. Using an optimization model largely parameterized with data from the Eastern Amazon, we investigate the effectiveness of renewability audits and performance bonds in inducing compliance with reduced-impact logging and harvest volume requirements. In weak enforcement environments, audits are unlikely to induce full compliance with harvest regulations, while performance bonds may be more effective. The use of royalty instruments such as the ad valorem and revenue-based royalties can generate revenues and, in the case of revenue-based instruments, modify harvest behavior, but only under limited circumstances.

Illicit exploitation of natural resources: The forest concessions in Brazil

The Brazilian forest sector has undergone crisis with complexities involved in investment in an insecure political environment, a regime of ambiguous property rights, forest sector illegality and enormous pressure for agricultural expansion. To address these challenges, Brazil's Public Forest Management Law was approved in 2006 enabling private forest management on public forestland. Assessing the policy in a dynamic computable general equilibrium framework, we find that household welfare improves and legal forestry grows faster. In the absence of improved monitoring and enforcement, however, forest concessions are shown to have a depressing effect on the price of forestland and accelerate illegal forestry operations.

Bidding system for allocating forest concessions in Africa

SUMMARY Concession allocation by competitive bidding is always fiercely resisted by the local forest industrialists, and sometimes even by members of the forest service. One will be told that “It can't be done”, “It is too complicated”, “It is too expensive” or some such thing. Of course people who benefit from arbitrary allocation will oppose a more objective, transparent and equitable mechanism. It is nonsense to say that it cannot be done, but it will only be done where there are considerable incentives, for example in the form of major grants or loans on favourable terms.The competitive bidding system proposed in this article can considerably increase the revenue of the forest owners, correcting the perennial problem of under-valuation, which not only reduces the revenues of the forest owners but also encourages over-cutting. Bidding can also reduce corruption, although it can of course also be — and often is — undermined by corruption.

Can we really manage tropical forests without knowing the species within? Getting back to the basics of forest management through taxonomy

Considering the pressures on tropical forests from deforestation and the recent expansion of harvesting through forest concessions in the Brazilian Amazon, it is imperative that forest management systems are scrutinized to ensure sustainability. One of the basic problems in forest management is the correct identification of species within the forest stand. While this is a well known issue, little consideration is given to how to mitigate this problem or its affects on management practices and conservation. This paper examines the current practice of forest inventories in the Brazilian Amazon, as part of the mandatory system of reduced impact logging (RIL), using extensive forest inventory verification. The results show that the RIL management plan implemented in the project area was based on a highly inaccurate forest inventory. At least 132 species or 43.5% of all species identified after botanical checking did not appear in the forest inventory and the common practice of matching vernacular names to scientific ones proved to be severely deficient. In contrast, a high percentage of field identifications based on local people's expertise were correct. We suggest changes to current practices, including the training and use of parataxonomists, the collection of samples for verification, and stricter government control over current practices, which will achieve greater accuracy in data collection and forest management planning. Ultimately, we argue that in the current climate of extensive deforestation and forest use, it is essential that all aspects of RIL systems are reevaluated in order to achieve economic and ecological sustainability.

Tenure Rights and Benefit Sharing Arrangements for REDD: A Case Study of Two REDD Pilot Projects in Cambodia

Deforestation and forest degradation account for up to 20% of the total annual anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, current approaches to address climate change include strategies to reduce deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries (REDD). Even though REDD is still under discussion within the UNFCCC framework, many REDD pilot projects are being implemented across the tropics. Securing local communities’ tenure rights and their equitable access to forest conservation benefits are critical in REDD because local communities could be excluded from REDD benefits if their land and forest access rights are not adequately addressed. In Cambodia, two REDD pilot projects: Community Forestry Carbon Offset Project (CFCOP) in Oddar Meanchey province and the Seima Protection Forest Project (SPF) in Mundulkiri province, are being implemented. This study aims to to contribute to the development of an effective REDD mechanism in Cambodia by examining land and forest tenures and benefit sharing arrangements under the two REDD pilot projects in Cambodia. The paper employs concepts of discourse coalitions and rules of the game to explain tenure rights and benefit sharing arrangements in the two projects. The study is based on literature review, analysis of key text documents and interviews with 19 respondents from government, civil society, donor community, community and private sector involved in the two REDD pilot projects and from outside. Results show that all forestlands in Cambodia belong to the state and various forest tenure regimes exit in Cambodia. These forest regimes include forest concessions, community forests, protection forests, protected areas, private forests and economic land concessions. Currently, the two REDD pilot projects are being implemented in community forests and protection forests. In both projects, local communities are granted forest access rights. In addition, the projects have legitimized tenure rights of local communities in the project areas as provided for through the Land and Forestry Law in Cambodia. The study also indicates that revenues from carbon credits generated by the projects will be shared with the local communities. According to the Government Decision No.699, more than 50% of net revenues will be channeled to local communities in the CFCOP while the sharing of the revenues in the SPF is still under consideration. The study offers lessons that could guide other REDD projects in securing local communities’ forest access rights and their rights to benefits from forest conservation.