Partnerships in Sustainable Forest Resource Management

Partnerships in Sustainable Forest Resource Management

Author: Mirjam A. F. Ros-Tonen

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 346

ISBN-13: 900415339X

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This book assembles experiences acquired with sustainable forest and tree resource management partnerships in various Latin American countries. It addresses the question of which conditions are necessary for partnerships to stimulate sustainable, socially just and pro-poor governance of forest resources.


Non-Timber Forest Products in the Global Context

Non-Timber Forest Products in the Global Context

Author: Sheona Shackleton

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2011-03-28

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 3642179835

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This book provides a comprehensive, global synthesis of current knowledge on the potential and challenges associated with the multiple roles, use, management and marketing of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). There has been considerable research and policy effort surrounding NTFPs over the last two and half decades. The book explores the evolution of sentiments regarding the potential of NTFPs in promoting options for sustainable multi-purpose forest management, income generation and poverty alleviation. Based on a critical analysis of the debates and discourses it employs a systematic approach to present a balanced and realistic perspective on the benefits and challenges associated with NTFP use and management within local livelihoods and landscapes, supported with case examples from both the southern and northern hemispheres. This book covers the social, economic and ecological dimensions of NTFPs and closes with an examination of future prospects and research directions.


Local Governance and Poverty in Developing Nations

Local Governance and Poverty in Developing Nations

Author: Nicky Pouw

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-06-17

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 113648082X

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This volume examines the persistence of poverty - both rural and urban - in developing countries, and the response of local governments to the problem, exploring the roles of governments, NGOs, and CSOs in national and sub-national agenda-setting, policy-making, and poverty-reduction strategies. It brings together a rich variety of in-depth country and international studies, based on a combination of original data-collection and extensive research experience in developing countries. Taking a bottom-up and multi-dimensional perspective of poverty and well-being as the starting point, the authors develop a convincing set of arguments for putting the priorities of poor people first on any development agenda, thus carving out an undisputable role for local governance in interplay with higher-up governance actors and institutions.


Decentralized Development in Latin America

Decentralized Development in Latin America

Author: Paul Lindert

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2010-03-02

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 904813739X

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Much of the scholarly and professional literature on development focuses either on the ‘macro’ level of national policies and politics or on the ‘micro’ level of devel- ment projects and household or community socio-economic dynamics. By contrast, this collection pitches itself at the ‘meso’ level with a comparative exploration of the ways in which local institutions – municipalities, local governments, city authorities, civil society networks and others – have demanded, and taken on, a greater role in planning and managing development in the Latin American region. The book’s rich empirical studies reveal that local institutions have engaged upwards, with central authorities, to shape their policy and resource environments and in turn, been pressured from ‘below’ by local actors contesting the ways in which the structures and processes of local governance are framed. The examples covered in this volume range from global cities, such as Mexico and Santiago, to remote rural areas of the Bolivian and Brazilian Amazon. As a result the book provides a deep understanding of the diversity and complexity of local governance and local development in Latin America, while avoiding the stereotyped claims about the impact of globalisation or the potential benefits of decentralisation, as frequently stated in less empirically grounded analysis.


African Ethnobotany in the Americas

African Ethnobotany in the Americas

Author: Robert Voeks

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-09-25

Total Pages: 432

ISBN-13: 1461408369

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African Ethnobotany in the Americas provides the first comprehensive examination of ethnobotanical knowledge and skills among the African Diaspora in the Americas. Leading scholars on the subject explore the complex relationship between plant use and meaning among the descendants of Africans in the New World. With the aid of archival and field research carried out in North America, South America, and the Caribbean, contributors explore the historical, environmental, and political-ecological factors that facilitated/hindered transatlantic ethnobotanical diffusion; the role of Africans as active agents of plant and plant knowledge transfer during the period of plantation slavery in the Americas; the significance of cultural resistance in refining and redefining plant-based traditions; the principal categories of plant use that resulted; the exchange of knowledge among Amerindian, European and other African peoples; and the changing significance of African-American ethnobotanical traditions in the 21st century. Bolstered by abundant visual content and contributions from renowned experts in the field, African Ethnobotany in the Americas is an invaluable resource for students, scientists, and researchers in the field of ethnobotany and African Diaspora studies.


Sustainable Development in Amazonia

Sustainable Development in Amazonia

Author: Kei Otsuki

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-03-12

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13: 1136179623

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This book argues against the assumption that sustainability and environmental conservation are naturally the common goal and norm for everyone in Amazonia. This is the first book focusing on agency, reflexivity and social development to address sustainable development in the region. It discusses the importance of looking into societal dynamics in order to deal with deforestation and sustainable development policies through the ethnography of an Amazonian settlement named New Paradise. This book demystifies utopian and overtly conservationist views that depict the Amazon rainforest as a troubled paradise. Engaging with social theory of practice with particular focus on emergentist perspectives and Foucault’s analysis of ‘heterotopia’, the author shows that Amazonia is a set of settlement heterotopias in which various local and external initiatives interact to make up real, lived-in places. The settlers’ placemaking continually rearranges power and material relations while the process usually emphasises utopian developmentalist and conservationist policy intervention. This book explores in detail how, as power relations are arranged and governance reshaped, sustainable development and construction of a green society also need to become a goal for the settlers themselves. The book’s insights on the relationship between the sustainable development frameworks used in environmental policy, and ongoing societal development on the ground inform debate both within Amazonia, and in comparable communities worldwide. It also offers institutional pathways to realise new, more engaging, policy intervention for development professionals and policy makers.


The United Nations in Latin America

The United Nations in Latin America

Author: Francis Adams

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2010-01-26

Total Pages: 209

ISBN-13: 1135177260

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Francis Adams examines the United Nations' efforts to promote sustainable in Latin America. Adams analyzes the development work of various UN institutions and agencies that sponsor economic and social programs in the developing world as well as the UN's various funding initiatives, global conferences, and institutional goals.


Forest People Interfaces

Forest People Interfaces

Author: Bas Arts

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-05-22

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 9086867499

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This book aims at both academics and professionals in the field of forest-people interfaces. It takes the reader on a journey through four major themes that have emerged since the initiation of 'social forestry' in the 1970s: non-timber forest products and agroforestry; community-based natural resource management; biocultural diversity; and forest governance. In so doing, the books offers a comprehensive and current review on social issues related to forests that other, more specialized publications, lack. It is also theory-rich, offering both mainstream and critical perspectives, and presents up-to-date empirical materials. Reviewing these four major research themes, the main conclusion of the book is that naïve optimism associated with forest-people interfaces should be tempered. The chapters show that economic development, political empowerment and environmental aims are not easily integrated. Hence local landscapes and communities are not as 'makeable' as is often assumed. Events that take place on other scales might intervene; local communities might not implement policies locally; and governance practices might empower governments more than communities. This all shows that we should go beyond community-based ideas and ideals, and look at practices on the ground.


Forests and Climate Change

Forests and Climate Change

Author: Anthony Hall

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

Published: 2012-04-01

Total Pages: 231

ISBN-13: 184980611X

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Controlling deforestation, which is responsible for about one-fifth of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, has become a major tool in the battle against global warming. An important new international initiative – Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) – provides economic incentives to forest users to encourage preservation of trees. Nearly all Latin American countries are introducing national REDD strategies and pilot schemes. This insightful book raises questions over some of the basic assumptions that underpin REDD policies in Latin America. It raises doubts about whether sufficient account is being taken of the complex social, economic, cultural and governance dimensions involved, advocating a comprehensive 'social development' approach to REDD planning. Forests and Climate Change is the first book to comprehensively examine REDD policies across Latin America, including a focus on social aspects. It will prove invaluable for academics and postgraduate students in the fields of environmental studies, environmental politics, geography, social planning, social and environmental impact assessment, development studies, and Latin American area studies. Policy-makers, planners and practitioners working on REDD at national and international levels (both official and NGO sectors) will also find plenty of refreshing data in this much-needed resource.