Title:	Forests and Rural Development
Authors:	Ju¨rgen Pretzsch Dietrich Darr Holm Uibrig Eckhard Auch
Keywords:	Forests
Issue Date:	2014
Publisher:	Springer
Description:	Two major approaches to forests were observed in the past. A utilitarian one, focused on the wood resources that could be obtained from the forests, and another one oriented to the environmental values related to the existence of forests. Both had their related constituencies and have shown limited capacity to learn from each other. Recently, a growing interest is being observed toward a third approach based on the social and cultural dimension of forests. Many loose ends that could be hardly integrated and assimilated from the previous approaches might, from a social lens, be easier to be addressed. In the political debate, the final argument to preserve forests is much more social than environmental or economical. Political controversy is solved by social categories that are ranked by values. The social and cultural approach to forests is a vast universe that includes issues like decent and health labor, cultural and spiritual values, traditional forest knowledge, anthropology, geographical history, indigenous people, community management of natural resources, and rural development. The growth of this approach is progressively incorporating new professions, sciences, and interested people to the forest dialogue and community, which enrich it while helping to overcome conflicts of the past. Overseeing the impressive coevolution of many ecosystems is a clear indication of the limitations of the previous approaches. One of the most consolidated ones is rural development. In developing countries, it could be rephrased as rural poverty alleviation by forests. Rural development is related to the contribution of forests to the livelihoods of the forest-related rural communities.
URI:	http://10.6.20.12:80/handle/123456789/47707
ISBN:	978-3-642-41404-6
Appears in Collections:	Rural Development Studies

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