Deforestation and Economie Development

Tropical deforestation is of growing concern to the world community. Global effects associated with this process include loss of biodiversity and changes in the carbon cycle. Although the importance and present severity of these two externalities are subjects of intense controversy, few would deny the cata­ strophic nature of their potential impacts. Deforestation also poses local and regional problems. Loss of tree coyer can destabilize the hydrologic cycle, leading to drier climate, desiccated soils, and increased flood risks in down­ stream areas. When poor farmers clear forest land for subsistence, they often impose substantial costs on their neighbours in the short run. Should land abandoned by these farmers prove barren and should processes of ecological succession be styrnied by edaphic conditions, an intertemporal opportunity cost arises in the long run, since possible forestry revenues and environmental protection values will be lost to future generations. Despite the importance of the tropical forest biome from an ecological perspective, forest coyer competes directly with the primary factor of agricul­ tural production, namely land. Development processes necessarily involve landscape changes as land is put to different and evolving uses in response to demographic phenomena, technological change, and shifts in consumer preferences. lndeed, substantial deforestation has occurred in the so-called developed world, a fact often overlooked in discussions on tropical deforest­ ation. Of the various forest types, the greatest deforestation losses have been realized in temperate closed forest, which has declined by 32 to 35 percent