Deforestation, with forest decline, is a planetary crisis resulting from numerous cosmological, social, economic, and demographic events. The crisis must be addressed through changes in policies and institutions. Saving the remaining wild forests is urgent, but not sufficient; massive reforestation is required-- replanting, regeneration, and the restoration of all forest components, from soil and microorganisms to herbs, trout, and wolves. And, that will require the involvement of communities, in addition to universities, governments and individuals.
Although forest cover in industrial countries is more or less stable, it has been declining in the US and Canada since 1963. It is declining dramatically in the southern hemisphere. Even in countries partially reforested in the 1960s, like India and China, forests are being cut again unsustainably to improve temporarily the standards of living (see the Mangrove Action Project news).
A lot of planting is done in fact by industrial forestry--but it is done primarily to increase supplies of pulp rather than to reforest areas that have been cleared. Some industrial forestry advocates ask if planting is even necessary--after all, almost two-thirds of the original forest area of the planet is still forested, although a far smaller (4 percent) percentage is in primary forest. Ecoforestry advocates ask how much of the planet should be forested. Answering questions like these is the domain of planning. Planning in general means deciding on goals to be achieved in specific situations.
Planning becomes more important as demand increases. According to Worldwatch, the world's commercial timber harvest expanded by more than 50 percent since 1965. In the Pacific Northwest, in the first half of the 1980s, timber harvests on industry-owned lands exceeded the sustained yield by 25 percent--by 61 percent in US national forests (sustained yield, remember, is a subset of sustainable forestry, since it refers only to stocks of wood and not biological diversity and environmental services of the forests). Part of the problem is that few planting goals and almost no permanent goals for coverage, are ever set, by anyone.
For central planning by state or province or federal governments, the goals are usually small and not comprehensive, such as a cutting level or a single species preservation, and usually end up being a compromise in cost-benefit analysis. For ecoforestry the goals are large and comprehensive--to the extent that small goals will be dictated by the large ones.
Goals, in one sense, are horizons that we travel towards, but in another sense they are the tools that shape us as we travel--as we are one of the tools, along with natural disturbances, pathogens, and other agents, that shape the forest. In industrial forestry, global and national goals are often more important than local goals. That is true for ecoforestry only to the extent that global cycles are to be protected; for economic reasons, local goals must be treated as more important than regional or global goals.
The reforestation goals for ecoforestry are divided into three levels of implementation, from the local to the global. Some of these goals are common sense, some will require legislation, and a few may require behavioral or cultural changes.
For example, our Moscow office is in a Pinus ponderosa/Physocarpus malvaceus association in the Pinus Zone in the eastern Palouse Hills in the Columbia Basin physiographic province in the Coniferous dry woodland and xeromorphic scrub biome; it is within the Paradise Creek watershed within the South Fork Palouse River watershed, which is part of the Columbia River watershed. Paradise Creek has been stripped of trees (by the first Caucasian homesteaders); other forested areas have been cleared for agriculture, and most recently, for construction.
Suitable goals for this local area include: Replant trees in all riparian areas, with at least 30-meter buffers. Reforest formerly forested agricultural lands in the foothills. Preserve all small old-growth areas--no plantation can be a substitute for keeping the remaining old-growth, and no secondary forest can match old- growth for biological richness or ecological importance. Protect the long-term health, integrity, and ecological balance of forests, that is, the ecological and evolutionary processes that make forests.
Protect the health of human communities. Broaden local economies from timber cutting--timber employment fell 15 percent between 1979-1989, during a time of record cutting levels and record corporate incomes--to alternative products. Set up cooperatives to refer and share work. Combine forest and agricultural crops where appropriate (in tree crops or permaculture). Tax timber and products so that benefits stay local. Expand local capital in forests.
Educate all people to feel their connections to the forest, because, until they feel them, they will not act ethically or ecologically. Educate people to realize that long-term sustainability requires healthy forests, and that protecting forests protects jobs
Specific goals would include: End logging in national forests; in the US, for instance, Clinton's 1993 FEMAT reported that the only way to ensure a chance of maintaining viable populations of all species in PNW coastal forests was to halt all logging, whereas the approved Option 9 (from outer space?) allows for the extirpation or extinction of 800 species.
Reforest areas large enough for minimum critical habitat or minimum viable populations of the native species necessary for native biodiversity (virtually no existing areas are large enough, even Yellowstone Park in the US). J. M. Thiollay concluded that, to maintain a complete bird community in French Guiana, with raptors, rainforest reserves would have to be between 1 and 10 million ha (1 ha = 2.47 acres). In Canada, for viable populations of wolves and elk, 10 million ha should be set aside.
Restore forest cover in North America to pre-European levels. For the US, replant 142 million hectares of forest lands--up to 438 million hectares total (the approximate level of cover in the year 1600). For Canada, replant over 80 million hectares of forest, up to 530 million hectares total. For the Northwest (Pacific NW coast forest, US and CND), replant up to 47 million ha. For the Northeast (northern hardwoods), replant up to 11 million ha. For the Southeast (Oak-pine forest), replant up to 129 million ha. For other ecoregions, replant to a high percentage of 2000 BC levels, especially around the Mediterranean.
Global goals include: Reimplement international initiatives to slow deforestation--the UN notes that previous initiatives accelerated deforestation, as in Cameroon, where log production is to double in the forest (home of 50,000 Pygmies with a unique and valuable cosmology and life-style). Employ initiatives to reforest areas, such as in Burundi, where only 1% of the forest is still virgin; at least 1,296,000 ha of forest should be restored. Plant and maintain forests sufficient to guarantee indefinite support of known and unknown global biogeochemical cycles. Protect fragile ecosystems with global importance. Reduce threats to forests from acid rain and other nonpoint-source pollutions. For the planet, this means reforesting 1.4 billion ha to restore the 30-40% forest cover removed in the past 3000 years. Reforestation goals only make sense in the context of other ecological or social/cultural goals, such as reducing demand for wood products, increasing efficiency in use, fitting human populations to biological limits, and educating people about the roles of forests. Personal goals, such as ensuring personal security and fulfillment, living frugally, or questioning industrial practices, are also relevant to the goals of the profession.
Most forests are now under stress. Forestry as a profession is under stress. There are separate angry, noncommunicating groups, such as foresters and preservationists. Ecoforestry, however, is not anti-forestry or anti-preservation. Furthermore, ecoforestry is not just a reaction to industrial forestry; rather, industrial forestry is one small perspective in the framework of ecoforestry (although industrial forestry has been distorted by excess profits and economic fears). Ecoforestry is a framework for forestry--it does not center on anything, it perceives and comprehends the whole forest system, centers and peripheral. The forest is polycentric anyway. Ecoforestry is based on a more comprehensive logic than the two-valued, dichotomizing logic of forestry and on a deeper philosophy than savage capitalism. Ecoforestry, as Arne Naess has said, is spacious enough to accommodate the viewpoints of all these groups, because it has emerged from a broad scientific and philosophical foundation. Ecoforestry is the first forestry to consciously consider multiple scales and other dimensions, as well as limits as well as other scales and other dimensions (history, ethics, equity).
Even today, our ignorance of the forest is incredible. We are not sure if mycorrhizal fungi can survive without squirrels; we are not sure what the productivity of the forests is or whether we are cutting the right trees or too many of them. We do not have facts to base our actions on. Nature is a stochastic process, always changing; forests are always changing. There is a profession, however, that acknowledges the operation of chance and makes conclusions in the absence of facts: it is called gambling--few people are successful at it. Even though it is guided by a better ethics and practices a more benign, sustainable exploitation, ecoforestry is also gambling. We do not know for sure what effects our actions, even individual tree selection or preservation, will have on the forest. The proper virtues for gambling with nature are humility and courage, not arrogance and fear. With these virtues, eventually we might develop wisdom.
A fir tree, like a pine marten or bark beetle, has biological wisdom; it is clearly self-making, self-governing, and self-choosing (within limits of its treeness). Forests are books of biological wisdoms. Through our cutting and decision making and overuse, we are tearing up the sacred books, literally leaf by leaf.
The current trend in desacralization is a human defense mechanism against the loss of meaning caused by industrial civilization. Ecoforestry is concerned with resacralizing forests, with restoring them to their extents and grandeurs, by regrounding science in ethics (as ways of living together), by changing our attitudes from utilization and flat efficiency towards awe and appreciation, and by participating with our hands and hearts in the lives of forests.
Alan Wittbecker is an ecologist with the Marsh Institute and editor of IJE.