Rainforest Destruction: Causes, Effects & False Solutions
The World Rainforest Movement
ISBN: 967-99987-2-X
90 pages, 15x21.5cm
Third World: US$4.00; Others: US$5.00

Please note: Book currently out of stock

Rainforest destruction is now recognised as one of the greatest environmental tragedies of all time. But why are the forests disappearing so rapidly?

Contrary to orthodox belief, it is not the poor who are responsible. Rather, the twin prongs of 'modernisation' and commercial interests (backed by aid money and bank loans) are devastating tropical forests through loggings, mining, dams, road and agriculture projects, and colonisation schemes.

The book provides a cogent analysis of the causes and effects of deforestation, from the viewpoint of the leading environmental groups involved in the defence of the forests.

It also points out that the "solutions" proposed by established institutions like the World Bank and the timber trade accelerate (and not reduce) deforestation.

CONTENTS

Introduction
Declaration of the World Rainforest Movement

Forests and Climate
The Richest Habitats on Earth
A Homeland for Forest Peoples
Maintaining and Conserving Soils
Regulating hydrological Regimes

Temperate area
Tropical area

Loss of Biodiversity
Destruction of Forest-Based Societies
Loss of Ecological Services
Climatic Disruption
Impoverished and Famine

Cash Crops and Plantations
Raching Schemes
Dams
Commercial Logging
Mining and Industry
Landlessness and Dispossession
Colonisation Schemes
Highways into Forested Areas
Pollution
Tourism

Tropical Forestry Action Plan
Sustained Yield Commercial Logging
Zoning the Forest
The International Biodiversity Programme
Conventional Pollution Control Strategies

Supporting Groups