In a critique of my paper on ‘greenhouse’ gas (GHG) emissions from Amazonian reservoirs (Fearnside 1995), Rosa et al. (1996) suggest that I have reached overly pessimistic conclusions because the reservoirs on which my calculations are based are unrepresentative and because methods based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) global warming potentials (GWPs) are unfair for comparing hydroelectric and fossil fuel options. I rush to defend my analysis.

In spite of the many laws and regulations regarding the development of property and the protection of open space and wildlife, developers often try to get around compliance with the law using subtle, or not–so–subtle, tactics. In some cases, they violate the law because they know that there is little or no enforcement, or, if caught, they pay the fine and charge it up as a cost of doing business which is of course tax-deductible. Over the last few years I have been involved in a status study on two species of lizards of special concern (the Orange-throated Whiptail, Cnemidophorus hyperythrus and the Coastal Horned Lizard, Phrynosoma coronatum) for the California Department of Fish and Game. During this study, I noticed several of what I call ‘developers' devious digressions’. As a biologist and environmental consultant, I have seen, over the last few decades, developers use these same ways of getting around environmental laws in Arizona, Montana, Mexico, and Australia. I have placed these digressions, detours and non-conformities, with the law in the following several categories.

This paper analyzes the justifications for governmental involvement in the development and commercialization of environmental technologies. To do so, a list of ‘generic’ rationales for government R&D involvement is extracted from various literature sources. Each rationale is discussed theoretically, and then analyzed in terms of its possible application to the environmental field. The intended contribution of the paper is to provide a theoretical background concerning the proper role of government in the development of environmental technologies. By determining the circumstances under which government involvement is justified, the groundwork is laid for the development of appropriate governmental policies.

The paper argues that there are several salient features of the environmental field which may justify governmental involvement. The increasingly high degree of environmental regulation has already caused indirect market failures that hinder private R&D efforts. Potential technologies to counter environmental externalities represent public goods which have social benefits for which there are no incentives in the private market. Uncertainty due both to our lack of understanding of the complexities of the natural environment and to shifting environmental regulations and policies may cause a risk aversion in the private sector against developing technologies. Imperfect public knowledge concerning environmental issues leads to less than optimal demand for new environmental technologies. All of these features generate market distortions which cause private R&D to deviate from what is socially optimal. As a result, governmental involvement in environmental technology development may well be warranted.

The environmental impact of the Nigerian economic Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) on the livelihood of the rural dwellers has been little studied. A study was conducted amongst 10 villages in the Olokemeji area of Oyo State, Nigeria using standardized interviews of 200 household heads.

The oil boom of the 1970s in Nigeria drove many male heads of households in the study area to the cities, but the collapse of the urban unskilled labour market in the 1980s brought men back to the villages. However, by 1990, renewed dominance of female-headed households in the study area has followed further male emigration. Changing roles of women in managing the forest environment are indicated over the three time periods and I argue that female-headed households attempt to conserve and improve the state of the environment more than their male counterparts. This is achieved through the cultivation of less nutrient-demanding crops such as cassava and yam, and using environmentally-friendly farming systems such as terracing and taungya.

The European Union is faced with major environmental problems related to nitrogen (N) compounds. The origins of three such problems, the atmospheric deposition of N compounds, the leaching of nitrates to ground-water and the anthropogenic N-input to the North Sea, are investigated by means of a Substance Flow Analysis (SFA); the reference year is 1988. Although the problems occur at various scales and have varying direct causes, food production and consumption together are the main responsible sectors, and the production and import of fertilizer appear to be the major ultimate sources in all three cases. Measures to combat these problems have been agreed to in various international frameworks: the European Community, the International North Sea Conference and the Rhine States Conference. These measures include technical emission reduction for acidifying compounds resulting in a 30% emission reduction; extension of the sewage treatment network and application of denitrification with 50% effectiveness; and introduction of measures directed at efficiency increase and emission reduction in agricultural practice in 10% of the agricultural area. The recent changes in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) are not expected to lead to significant changes in N flows. Assuming full implementation, an almost sufficient 45% reduction is expected for the anthropogenic nitrogen input into the North Sea. The atmospheric deposition of nitrogen compounds will be reduced by approximately 20%. The leaching of nitrates to the ground-water is expected to remain at the current level or even to increase a little. In all, these measures are conducive to solving, but do not satisfactorily solve, the three problems, mainly because the ultimate origins of the problems are not sufficiently influenced and measures therefore inevitably result in a shifting of problems.

In order to determine whether mercury from distant goldmining affected health in the districts of lranduba and Barreirinha, Amazonas State, Brazil, mercury in the scalp hair of 101 peasants (39 males and 62 females) was determined by cold vapour atomic absorption. In both areas fish is the major source of dietary protein. The average hair mercury content was 38.6 ppm (1SD = 14.1) in Barreirinha, where the diet contains a high proportion of carnivorous fish, and 5.6 ppm (1SD = 3.1) in Iranduba, where the diet contains more herbivorous fish. The levels found in women's hair in Barreirinha are particularly critical in view of the evidence that peak maternal hair mercury levels above 70 ppm are associated with 30% of risk of neurological disorder in the offspring, and that 5% risk may be associated with a peak mercury level of 10–20 ppm in the maternal hair (WHO 1990).

The health of many people, and thus forest preservation, are threatened. An environmental monitoring and health programme is urgently needed for the Brazilian Amazon. Dietary assessment could be a useful indicator of the risk of mercury poisoning, if taken together with periodic analysis of mercury contents of commonly eaten fishes and of scalp hair, particularly that of young and pregnant women. Environmental monitoring is pointless if not directed at effective action; and a planning approach to this is suggested which includes a major educational component.

An historical overview of human intervention in the natural environment of Crete is presented by considering trends in human population size as well as land-use records since the Neolithic period. Trends in human impacts over the last forty years are interpreted from available statistical data on human population, forests, rangelands, livestock and cultivated areas from 20 villages of the Psilorites Mountain area, central Crete. Depopulation occurred, mainly from 1961 to 1971, with migration to urban centres of Crete and abroad; this affected traditional land-use in the uplands and transformed the rural landscape. An increase of rangelands then occurred at the expense of forests, and human activities in agricultural lands intensified, through such as tree cultivation and irrigation. Livestock grazing has become a dominant activity on all wildlands with a dramatic increase in animal numbers (70.4% in sheep and 50.8% in goats recorded in 1992 as compared with 1981), attributable to European Union subsidies. This overstocking, coupled with frequent pastoral wildfires and uncontrolled grazing, has resulted in rapid changes of land-use systems and landscapes on Psilorites that now endanger the natural environment and resources.

Although bushmeat is known locally to be an important source of protein, large-scale patterns of demand are poorly defined. One area for which information is especially lacking is northern Cameroon, and this study therefore conducted a survey of 345 households in this region. Information sought from questionnaire interviews included the frequency of consumption, species preferences, and prices of bushmeat, together with people's perceptions of trends in the wildlife population involved. Bushmeat was estimated to represent c. 24% of the animal protein intake in the region and respondents generally preferred bushmeat to meat from domestic livestock. North African porcupine (Hystrix cristata) was the most preferred species, closely followed by guinea fowl (Numida meleagris), and Buffon's kob (Kobus kob). There was a tendency for the price of a kilogramme of bushmeat to decrease with the weight of the animal. A majority of the respondents said they perceived declines in some wild animal species within the last 10 years. For those who eat bushmeat one or more times a week, there was a tendency for villagers to eat more bushmeat than for people in towns. A number of measures should be taken, including wildlife farming and domestication and anti-poaching measures in national parks.

The accelerating decline of many of the world's forests represents one of the greatest problems and opportunities facing the global community. However little it may be recognized in its full scope, the forests crisis constitutes a profound and often irreversible degradation of both the biosphere and humanity's prospects. If this crisis is not contained and countered, extensive sectors of the world may well lose much, if not most, of their forest cover within the foreseeable future. I have drawn on my 30 years of field research in all three major forest biomes, together with my work with dozens of governments and agencies (FAO, the World Bank, etc.), backed by an in-depth review of the literature, to appraise the forests situation from both natural-science and social-science standpoints. My main finding is that deforestation is due partly to our scientific ignorance of forests' contributions to our welfare, both actually and potentially; partly to our meagre economic understanding of what is at stake; and partly to our lack of institutional capacity to manage forests for everybody's benefit, now and forever. I argue that forests are vital to the sustainable well-being of local communities, national economies and the biosphere. Yet they attract too little attention by governments dealing with the future of forests, also dealing with the future of a world that may eventually find itself with only a fraction as many forests as today.

I urge that we broaden our understanding of what it will take to save remaining forests. Primarily we should recognize that in the main this is no longer a forestry problem alone. While much can still be achieved through traditional forestry practices, also through more protected areas within forests and other ‘defensive’ measures, these activities often do no more than tackle symptoms of deeper problems. In tropical forests, for instance, we must address the source problem of shiftcd-cultivator encroachment. Anything less is akin to building a fence around tropical forests (which would take an awful lot of timber), a fence that would be speedily over-run by multitudes of land-hungry farmers.

There is growing recognition that forests make multiple contributions to the welfare of people throughout forest zones, of people throughout nations concerned, and of people throughout the world. Similarly the forests' survival depends on factors arising throughout the forests themselves, throughout nations concerned, and throughout the world. Fortunately this new recognition has been matched by growing awareness of the rapid decline of the Earth's forests.

Much of the policy programme proposed will be difficult. But it will not be so difficult as living in a world bereft of its forests.