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  • Print publication year: 2008
  • Online publication date: October 2011

CHAPTER 8 - The Myth of Sustainability and the Fate of Forests

from Part II - Scientific Forestry, Forest Management and Environmental Change
Summary

The framing of a suitable working plan thus involves an intimate knowledge of the requirements of the various species dealt with and of their rate of growth, knowledge which depends largely on the results of scientific research, and without which working plans must necessarily be of a tentative and provisional nature, as indeed many Indian plans are at present.

‘The Work of the Forest Department in India’, a report prepared in 1920 under the direction of the Inspector-General of Forests, p. 14, in April 1920 B progs 45–56, Revenue and Agriculture (Forests), NAI.

Although concern about and interest in the global role and fate of forests are currently great, the existing level of knowledge about forests is inadequate to develop sound forest management policies. Current knowledge and patterns of research will not result in sufficiently accurate predictions of the consequences of potentially harmful influences on forests, including forest management practices that lack a sound basis in biological knowledge. The deficiency will reduce our ability to maintain or enhance forest productivity, recreation, and conservation as well as our ability to ameliorate or adapt to changes in the global environment.

The USA National Research Council Report of 1990 entitled Forestry Research: A Mandate for Change

Foresters contend that scientific forestry meant sustainable management of forests. All forests were managed according to the working plans which prescribed only ‘maximum sustainable yield’.

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Himalayan Degradation
  • Online ISBN: 9788175968509
  • Book DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/UPO9788175968509
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