Fores~~;ology
Management
ELSEVIER Forest Ecology and Management 97 (1997) 91-92
Book Review
Forest ecosystems, forest management and the bation variability, forest ecosystems continuously
global carbon cycle. Michael J. Apps and David T. change from periods in which they are a source of
Price (Editors), 1996, 452 pp., DM 280.00. atmospheric carbon to periods in which they are net
sinks. For strategies to offset global carbon emission
In 1992, 150 nations signed the UN Framework through forest management, an understanding is
Convention on Climate Change, and committed needed of the proportion of the carbon flux due to
themselves to stabilize the concentration of green- anthropogenic perturbations, and what part corre-
house gases in the atmosphere. With this act, the role sponds to natural disturbance regimes. Several pa-
of forests and forest management in the global car- pers in Part One also analyze feed-back mechanisms
bon cycle moved beyond two decades of scientific likely to occur in a global warming trend.
discussion to become a subject debated in the inter- Part Two (the global carbon cycle and forest land
national policy arena. use: past, present and future) reviews available data
This book is an important scientific contribution on the state of and change in cover, use, and man-
to these debates. It is the work of 37 scientists, agement of forest land and the approaches used to
brought together in a NATO Advanced Research interpret these data for estimating carbon pools and
Workshop held on 12-18 September 1994, at Banff flows between forests and the atmosphere.
Conference Center in Alberta, Canada. The work- A conclusive picture of the relative importance of
shop examined the ability of forests to sequester forests in the global carbon cycle appears difficult to
atmospheric carbon, and how human activities affect draw. Efforts to locate the missing carbon sink of the
this ability. The papers and workshop discussions are global carbon balance have recently focused on ter-
presented in four thematically related parts: (1) forest restrial ecosystems, but the exact location of a global
ecosystems and the global carbon cycle; (2) sustain- carbon sink still remains a scientific challenge.
able forest land use: past, present and future; (3) Lack of data, differences in data interpretation
forest products, biomass and the carbon cycle; (4) and model assumptions, and insufficient understand-
human dimensions and socio-economic issues. Each ing of some basic processes contribute significantly
part is preceded by an editor’s introduction, followed to the difficulty of setting up a global carbon bal-
by the individual contributions of the workshop’s ance.
participants, and concluded by a summary paper of As a conclusion of practical importance in Part
the four working groups. Two, halting deforestation, especially in the tropics,
Part One (forest ecosystems and the global carbon appears to be the most effective strategy to follow to
cycle) addressing a variety of topics, such as nutrient allow forests to mitigate global carbon emissions.
mobilization, fire ecology, pest outbreaks, and rates Part Three (the global carbon cycle, forest prod-
of peat accumulation and decomposition, focuses on ucts and forest biomass) analyzes the effects of
forest ecosystem processes and dynamics, and dis- forest management on the global carbon cycle, in-
cusses how these factors affect the global carbon cluding carbon storage in forest products and substi-
cycle. Responding to both natural and human pertur- tution of fossil fuels with wood. The papers address
0378-l 127/00/$17.00 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.
PII SO378-1 127(97)00031-5
questions such as which forests types and which pact on the global carbon budget is to be achieved by
management regimes may sequester more carbon. forest managementand policy decisions.
Apparently, the role that forests and the forestry There is no doubt that the book--addmssesa
sector can play in sequestering carbon is a matter of variety of topics that are essentialfor understanding
disagreement. Much of the apparent disagreement the role of forests and forest management in the
may be explained by the adoption of inconsistent global carbon cycle. The discussion01’xeveral cru-
methodologies and differences concerning a defini- cial issues. the literature review of the individuai
tion of the forestry sector, the time horizon consid- papers. and the addresslist of the work-shop partici-
ered, and model assumptions about the decay rate of pants make this book an excellent reference toor
forest products, the displacement effect of fossil studentsand researchers.
fuels, and the long-term accumulation of products in The ‘frequently intense debate’ announced in the
disposed landfills. The need for a comprehensive preface of the book appearsa little smoothed in the
standardized procedure for carbon budgeting is prop- summary papers of the working groups. Subjects of
erly stressed. disagreement as well as subjects of consensusarc
Part Four (the human dimension: the global car- equally important outputs of an international scien-
bon cycle and socio-economics) addresses several tific workshop. Readersmay find it useful for their
topics related to human needs and impacts on forests own research to recognize urgent research needs in
and the global carbon cycle. Socio-economic realities questions that have generated an intense debate and
ultimately dictate land-use patterns and human im- about which opinions may remain polarized.
pacts on forests. Understanding these realities and On the other hand, points of broad consensus
how they affect land-use changes are essential for representa good synthesisof the state of knowledge
policy and management decisions related to forests. on which a less-experiencedresearchercan start to
Of practical relevance is the development of ac- build knowledge.
counting methodologies for evaluating costs and Global carbon estimatesrequire appropriate data.
benefits of CO, sequestering with forest manage- much is being done in manipulating and interpreting
ment strategies. The implications of such strategies data that have been obtained at a scale and for a
are complex: the global dimension of the benefits purpose that are different from that at which infer-
expected from carbon sequestering makes economic ences are made. Data gaps also may. explain that
analysis difficult, and potential conflicts with other surprisingly few papers seem to be concerned with
management purposes are a matter of concern. Intro- testing hypotheses about model assumptions and
ducing carbon to forest management and policy variables included in the models. As long as global
agendas in the near future seems to be an ambitious issuesare of concern among the scientific commu-
task, at least at the global implementation scale that nity and the global society, researchshould be coor-
is required to obtain a significant mitigation effect on dinated, and efforts should be dedicated in a bal-
global carbon emissions. anced way to data gathering, hypothesis testing, and
Deforestation and forest degradation in the tropics model development.
are examples of carbon budget processes that are
difficult to stop because of the human factor. A
variety of interacting factors, such as poor govem- Lucia Pedroni
ment policies, unsustainable agriculture and logging. Centro Agroncimir-o Ttwpicd
iniquitous land distribution, poverty, fuel-wood col- de Incestigaci6n y Enseknza ICATIE)
lection, foreign debt, armed conflicts, and so on have 7170 Turrialba
to be addressed simultaneously if a significant im- CostaRicn
