CONVENTIONAL METHODS OF PRESERVING THE AMAZON (5,9)
(AND WHY THESE METHODS FAIL IN THE
LONG RUN):
1. Rainforest Reserves: This
is the most popular and widely-put forward solution to preserving the rainforest.
Making and protecting these reserves are mostly taken up by large private
organizations. However, the rainforest covers a vast area and it is
incorrect to believe in the first place that the greater proportion of the
genetic diversity of the Amazon rainforest (where the total number of individuals
of each species tend to be low, and the variety tends to be great) can be
protected by limited areas of reserves. The diversity of the Amazon
makes it inevitable that large-scale projects will lead to the extinction
of large numbers of species. Only by trying to protect the greatest
area of the Amazon rainforest can we preserve the gargantual genetic diversity
of organisms contained in the tropical rainforest. In addition to being
hopelessly unable to ensure the survival of the Amazon's diversity, the reserve
system is widely used as an excuse by mining and timber industries to exploit
the unreserved areas.
2. Sustained Yield Forestry: This
is a very "in-mode" term to use in questions regarding logging in the Amazon
rainforest. This basically refers to a system of logging where there
is a continual maintenance of a whole ecosystem where logging is done in
a fixed area, the area of the rainforest allowed to regrow, and then logged
again, resulting in a "sustained yield" in a closed ecosystem. However,
as of yet, there are no examples of sustainable, industrial tropical timber
operations in the world. There are three very important reasons for
this:
- Bad methods of extraction:
Extraction of logs require heavy machinery and the continual movement
of these machinery along with the cutting of trees results in the compacting
of soil. As explained in the logging
section, it destroys the soil profile, so that the timber trees cannot regrow
to their full extent, so the yield cannot practically be sustained.
- Commercial Pressures: All industries are in the
business in the long run to make profits. And profits are made by the
minimization of costs and fast and efficient production. As such, timber
and logging industries are in no way inclined to waste their time regrowing
used lands when there's more trees all around. Neither do they want
to waste financial resources in reforestation techniques which will lower
their profits.
- Corruption: This is an insiduous problem associated
with most third-world countries. Government officials are quite susceptible
to bribes and when they're not, its quite easy to remove them from the picture.
This makes it easy for large corporations to legalize their wrongful
activities and gain licenses to more and more land, once what they have is
used up. The cost of bribing high officials or making them disappear
is much more cost- and time-effective for the timber industrialists than
applying sustained yield forestry and reforesting used lands.
3. Displacement of Indigenous Peoples: Using techniques such
as rainforest reserves, the government and different organizations displace
indigenous people from their land, failing to recognize their civil rights
over their own lands, and disintegrating these indigenous cultures in the
process. It is undoubtedly a fact that any reforestation or preservation
technique must include the assistance of indigenous people who have been
living in harmony with the Amazon for thousands of centuries.
4. The Tropical Forest Action Plan: TFAP was the first major
international attempt aimed at tackling the problems facing the Amazon rainforest.
With billions of dollars and international support, it has failed.
A few of the simple reasons for this include:
- It operates on the assumption that giving monetary
value to the rainforest itself will provide others with motivation to save
it. So, this plan aims at promoting the tropical timber industry. However,
lack of proper enforcement has allowed the industry to thrive using the TFAP's
help along with illegal means to bypass regulations.
- It focuses on the wrong problems and blames the victims
for the problems. Basic causes as identified by TFAP are overpopulation
and poverty of third-world South American countries, but it fails to recognize
the role of industrialized countries who use the Amazon's resources as raw
materials, and the essential problem of landlessness of the poor farmers
who have been displaced from what little land they had by the large timber
corporations in the first place.
- The TFAP left no room for grassroots participation and
worked independently of NGOs (Non-Government Organizations). As such,
the concerns of the poor farmers went largely unnoticed, and a plan where
the majority of the peoples problems are not addressed is bound to fail.
5. The International Biodiversity Program (
10):
A "Biodiversity Action Program" pursued by the World Bank, it aims
fails to confront the underlying causes of biodiversity loss.
- It encourages monocultures, i.e. growing only a single
kind of crop on the same land, year after year, failing to recognize that
a key aspect to biodiversity loss is the replacement of traditional species-rich
agriculture and forest practices with large-scale monocultures.
- It promotes creating reserves as an important way
to preserve rainforests and as expained above, it fails to protect the Amazon's
diversity, and also justifies the exploitation of the rest of the Amazon
rainforest.
- Biodiversity is valued in monetary terms, and is not
recognized for its own sake. As long as money is involved, the principles
of conservation cannot be fully appreciated and human values regarding preservation
will not change.
- The program places too much important and uses too many
resources on protecting the genetic diversity of the Northern parts where
there is more civilization and large organizations, like International Bureau
for Plant Genetic Resources, are located, and comparatively ignores
the Southern portions where most of the Amazon's diversity is concentrated.