最友善的砍伐－热带森林管理与经营.docVIP

最友善的砍伐－热带森林管理与经营 Translated Edited by Chen Jilong TEXT 27 The kindest cut （陈继龙 编译） May 25th 2006 From The Economist print edition DEPRESSING reports about how quickly the worlds tropical forests are being f________ are commonplace. But depressing reports about the state of the trees that are still standing are much rarer. In fact, a new study from the International Tropical Timber Organisation (ITTO), an offshoot of the United Nations, claims to be the first exhaustive survey of tropical-forest management ever undertaken. Its findings, although grim, do contain a [1]kernel of hope. 有关全球热带森林遭到乱砍滥伐、令人痛心的报道极为常见，但是痛陈现存林木状况的报道却少之又少。 事实上，联合国分支机构——国际热带木材组织（ITTO）新近开展的一项研究，据称是首次对热带森林 管理现状进行深入调查。其发现虽然令人沮丧，但从中我们还是看到了一线希望。 The ITTO examined “permanent forest estate”, meaning land that the governments of its 33 members have formally set aside for forests, and is therefore subject to some form of regulation or protection. The category includes both national parks and timber concessions, in both public and p________ hands. It covers 814m hectares, and accounts for roughly two-thirds of the worlds tropical forests. ITTO调查的对象是“永久性森林地产”，也就是被ITTO所属33个成员国政府正式划作森林地域，从而受到某种形式的管理或保护的土地。它涉及国家森林公园和木材的特许经营，包括国营和私营。地产总面 积达8.14亿公顷，约占全球热带森林面积的三分之二。 The concept is important, explains Duncan Poore, one of the authors of the report, because it is not always possible, or desirable, to protect every last grove against encroaching[2] farms or homes. Instead, governments should c__________ on maintaining the forests that are the most commercially and scientifically valuable. Yet the ITTOs researchers found that only 15% of the permanent forest estate has a management plan, and less than 5% of it is sustainably managed. That still amounts to an area the size of Germany, the report notes, and represents a dramatic improvement since 1988, when an earlier and less extensive survey found that only one country in the tropics—Trinidad and Tobago—had any well-run forests at all. But relativ