ENG 102 12:15
Judith Van
Save the Rainforest
“Save the Rainforest.” “Don’t bungle the jungle.”
We’ve all heard these sayings
time and time again, but when we are at the store, about to purchase
a nice entertainment center for our TVs and stereos, “How can we be sure
that our money is supporting our social and political concerns?”
(Stark 1) Our efforts to save the rainforest aren’t as clear as they
may seem. It is difficult to tell where wood comes from and where
it is produced.
“There isn’t a way for the individual to identify a good wood
from the bad, well-managed forests from ill managed, both domestically
and tropically,” said Scott Landis, President of the Woodworkers Alliance
for Rainforest Products (WARP), a non-profit organization of woodworkers,
instrument makers and architects and designers. Landis suggests that
as consumers, we should educate ourselves about the sources of products
they sell. By looking around for signs and labels to see if they
indicate responsible use of the rainforest and its products.
Without a better understanding of how the forest works, what
influences it creates, dynamics and how resistant it is, there is little
probability of any future for the few forests that still remain.
It will be very difficult to change public opinions or remove some of the
pressures forests face without attending a program of education.
Some of the pressures on the rainforest, such as the rise of changing cultivation
and population, come from hunger promoted by unequal ownership. (Park
31) I propose that the government in Brazil take nationalistic siege
on all lumber exportation to foreign nations.
Yanez, 2
Governments spend a lot of money trying to help the ecology if rainforests,
but apparently there has been little luck. According to Chris Park
in Tropical Rainforests, “There have been numerous calls for major investment
of time, money and trained personnel into research of rainforest ecosystems.
While scientific research in recent decades has revealed a great deal about
this unique and highly complicated ecosystem, important questions are still
unanswered. There are still many gaps we need to know how to better
understand the structure and ecology of rainforests. About 93 percent
of the land are owned by only seven percent of the landowners. (Park 130)
In Brazil, only one percent of the farms occupies over forty
three percent of the total farmland, forcing half of the farms to be squeezed
onto less than three percent of the land and leaving about seven million
families without land. (Park 131) This is great example of
how corrupt the government can be. This is causing more pressure
on the forest. Critics of the Brazilian government need to remove
the responsibility held by the rich people and place it back on the hands
of the people in the country because that is whom it truly belongs to.
The only problem is that even though land is dedicated to the Indians,
they still don’t own it. The Brazilian government retains control
over this area. (Park 131)
“Economics is at the heart of what’s driving a lot of rainforest
destruction,” said Landis of WARP. “People need to eat, provide food
for their families, and that will take precedence over the survival of
a timber species or survival of a timber or a forest.” On the opposing
side, Keister Evans of the Tropical Forest Foundation states, “It’s unrealistic
to ask developing countries to isolate an important natural resource and
not use any of it.
Yanez, 3
You can’t rope the forests off and make national forests out of them.”
His organization includes importers of tropical woods, environmentalists,
furniture manufacturers, educators, and representatives of the major producing
nations.
There is no doubt about the urgency and importance of the tropical
deforestation crisis amongst foresters and conservationists, but debate
about what’s causing the problem and what the answers are, also exist.
Foresters like to argue that logging itself does not destroy the forest,
if done properly, but it’s the results that ruin the forest.
Conservationists don’t believe that boycott of tropical woods
are an effective conservation strategy. (Willie 60) Since boycotts
require a lot of time organizing for funds and publicity, critics say,
these efforts could be used in educating the public about the complex causes
of deforestation or possibly to convince the government to reduce the debt
pressure on tropical countries. (Ussach 26) On the other hand,
boycotts convince consumers that they are helping find a solution when
they really aren’t.
Behind the colonization come the problems of poverty, overpopulation
and unequal land distribution. For those of us who are not politicians,
we can avoid deforestation by avoiding the purchases of products that are
linked with tropical rainforest hardwoods. This helps contribution
to the destruction of the few forests that are left and the indigenous
people living there. (Wille 66)
Obviously, control over the environment can be cut both ways.
For almost every job lost to environmental regulation, environmentalists
confirm that even more jobs would be lost at an unregulated government.
Logging, oil drilling, and fishing are a few
Yanez, 4
examples of so-called “extractive industries,” which is more true for
them because they use up finite resources. (Bean 2)
No one debates the fact that today’s loggers and other workers are
going to be affected by methods to save the “spotted owl.” Yet, supporters
of the conservation effort say these same workers would find themselves
without jobs in a couple of decades from now if the industry continues
cutting down the old trees. (Mical 3)
In an article, Brazilians Rainforest Shocks a Lumber Buyer,” Lee James
was sent from the U.S. to Brazil to study the feasibility of purchasing
directly from Brazilian mills instead of U.S. suppliers. As him and
his Brazilian contact headed towards the rainforest expecting to see the
most beautiful thing ever, they approached smells of charcoal fires, food,
woodsmoke and open sewers. This is when he realized that the best
lumber was being sent to the European market, which pays a higher price.
He had a hard time trying to decide if he should support to accomplish
any slowdown of the raping of the forests or if his employer would listen
to his decision. He finally decided that his excitement was “looking
up a towering tree and wonder what it could say if it were to speak.”
He came to the conclusion that he wanted his grandchildren to grow up thinking
the same, so he said “no” to slow the market by increasing the price.
We must begin to think just like Lee James did. Do we want our
children to experience the beauty of the rainforest? In a study by
Eustaquio Reis, an economist at IPEA, an economic think tank of the Brazilian
government, shows that the destruction is not going to abate without new
policies by the government to relieve the problem it created.
Yanez, 5
The peak years of deforestation came in 1983-1987 when, the Brasilia
subsidy machine was whirring fastest. (Reis 8) Most of the
burning came from the people who created the “subsidy farms” in the wilderness.
This is land that they never intended using, but for which they collected
a subsidy on proof that they had cleared it. The government needed
money for tax breaks, subsidies or road building, and the contraction of
the national economy was taking its toll. Since then it has been
decreasing. However, Reis suggests, that as soon as Brazil’s economic
growth picks up again, so will the burning.
The causes of aftermath are the disappearance if vital needs, such
as food and medicine, global warming, and disappearance of life as we know
it. Global warming is one of the most important, in my opinion. Global
warming was brought to the world’s attention in 1988. (Hecht 18)
Deforestation triggers global climatic changes by altering atmospheric
circulation patterns and chemistry. These have different impacts
on different places and causes global warming. (Hecht 15)
Outsiders who worry about global warming have good reason to back Brazil
in preventive efforts. It costs $4 in forestalled Amazonian destruction,
$10 for a 10% reduction in the emissions of American cars ad factories,
$30 for Amazonian reforestation, and $130 for a 50% reduction in American
emissions to keep a ton of CO2 from being released into the atmosphere.
Outsiders who are realistic, though, should realize that the fate of the
Amazon would mostly be settled by something strictly
Yanez, 6
Brazilian, which is the country’s success in correcting its old
problems of poverty and misgovernment.
Although there have been many failures, lots of experience has demonstrated
successful solutions to deforestation and misuse of land. These efforts
have, in a sense, been ignored by many. According to Paulo Nogueira-Neto,
Secretary of the Environment in Brazil, based on lessons learned from both
successful and unsuccessful experiences in the past, enough is known to
begin an effort to fight deforestation.
Obviously, foresters alone cannot achieve this. Both public and
private sectors, from government ministries to local community groups,
are needed in order to quickly expand tropical rainforest conservation
and development programs.
Depending on political leadership and appropriate policy changes success
to avoid deforestation is possible. A commitment to forestry, agriculture,
energy and related rural development program is required. (Nogueira-Neto
14)
There are a few easy ways to help save the rainforests. Recycling,
using plastic instead of wooden materials and using recycled products are
some of the most easy ways to help save the forests right at home.
Try recycling paper and aluminum products to reduce the cutting down of
trees. Also, paper and plastic can also be recycled, so be sure to
use recycled paper and plastic instead of wooden products. If everyone
helps out a little bit, our forests would not be vanishing as fast.
Works Cited
Park, Chris. Tropical Rainforests. New York, New
York, 1992.
Wille, Chris. “Buy or Boycott Tropical Hardwoods?” American Forests. July/ August 1991: 55-70.
Reis, Eustaquio. “Brazil: The Blessed and the Cursed.”
The Economist. December 1991: 8-10.
“Brazil Launches New Approach To Protect Rainforests.” Worldwide
Forest/Biodiversity Campaign News. http://www.conservation.org/ (December
9, 1996)
Stark, Judy. “Saving the Rainforest.” St. Petersburg
Times 1D. July 1992. Newsbank: Floridian (1992)
Hecht, Susanna and Cockburn, Alexander. The Fate of the Forest: Developers, Destroyers and Defenders of the Amazon. New York: New York, 1989.
Report of an International Task Force convened by the World Resources
Institute, The World Bank, and the United Nations Development Programme.
Tropical Forests: A Call for Action Part 1 The Plan.
United Nations1985.
Bean, Michael. “Save An Owl, Kill a Logger.” Executive
Summary. 1/92-6/98. Sunlib.lib.asu.edu/webspirs-bin/
Repetto, Robert and Gillis, Malcolm. Public Policies and
the Misuse of Forest Resources. New York: NY, 1988.
Save The Rainforest
Magaly Yanez