In the 1990s, tourism received increasing attention as a low-impact, non-consumptive development option, in particular for developing countries. It is argued that tourism allows for the use of areas which are otherwise of low value, such as remote beaches, but perfectly meet the demands of the growing travel industry (e.g. WWF [World Wide Fund for Nature ] 1995; World Bank 1998). In line with the concept of sustainable tourism, it is believed that negative social and environmental impacts can be avoided or minimized if tourism development is thoroughly well planned and controlled. This view can be contrasted with the fact that what may be considered sustainable forms of tourism still represent an extremely small share of all tourism, presumably less than 5%, and that some impacts like the use of energy and its global consequences have virtually been excluded from the discussion on sustainability.

In Sweden, public awareness of change in the environment has increased in recent decades (Gillberg 1999). An important tool which contributed to an understanding of how the flora is affected by changes in the environment was created by Ellenberg (1974). Six ecological factors, namely light, temperature, continentality, moisture, reaction and nitrogen, were each divided into 9 (in the case of moisture 12) so-called indicator values. A species given a low value occurs mainly where the factor is less pronounced, and vice versa, species in light class 1 prefer full shadow, 5 half shadow, and 9 full light.

There is evidence in the literature that a variety of logging practices may result in significant short and long-term changes to vegetation in the forest understory, however, these changes are still largely unknown for many forest types. The objective of this study was to determine the short-term effects of shelterwood logging on tree and non-arboreal plant species composition and diversity in both the understory and sapling strata within the Owain Lake Stand of old-growth red and eastern white pine located in Temagami, Ontario. The most significant changes were increases of white birch (800%), red maple (363%) and bracken fern (110%) in the understory. The most significant decreases within the understory occurred in mosses and liverworts (110%), Canada mayflower (49%) and starflower (28%). Bracken fern, red maple, and bush honeysuckle were the three most abundant species in the post-harvest understory plant community and will probably increase in their abundance under the present disturbed condition. A second shelterwood cut in 20 to 40 years may further facilitate an increase in these three species primarily by increasing light levels at the forest floor. All three species are very vigorous and are likely to dominate the forest understory until the upper canopy closes resulting in decreased light intensity at the forest floor.

Towards the end of the Gulf War in 1991, the retreating Iraqi forces destroyed numerous oil installations in Kuwait, causing widespread oil pollution to extended areas of the desert ecosystem. Vegetation development in an oil-contaminated area of northern Kuwait, where the natural vegetation is dominated by the dwarf shrub Haloxylon salicornicum, was studied seven years after the release of the oil. Some sites of the study area were largely unaffected, whereas others were contaminated to varying degrees by oil. Tar-like oil tracks accounted for the largest proportion of contaminated ground, and these remained largely unvegetated. However, a number of Haloxylon shrubs survived the oil contamination mainly due to the presence of phytogenic hillocks around their bases. These phytogenic hillocks provided ‘safe sites’ for a number of plant species. This also applied to blow-outs, former phytogenic hillocks on the oil tracks that had been subject to severe sand deflation in recent years. Species composition on both the phytogenic hillocks and in the blow-outs was very similar to that of the control area. Laboratory studies showed that the seed bank under the oil tracks had been annihilated. The number of seedlings emerging from soil samples was lower on the phytogenic hillocks and blow-outs than in the control areas. We conclude that recolonization of oil tracks will gradually take place as the hard surface of the tracks begins to disintegrate, or in part becomes covered by sand. The break-up of the track surface has already begun to a limited extent, mainly due to factors such as off-road driving, large herds of grazing animals, burrowing animals (lizards, rodents) and colonies of ants. It is suggested that a specific programme aimed at breaking up the hard surface and allowing it to become mixed with uncontaminated sand would probably greatly enhance recolonization.

Traditional communities living at forest margins use forest resources in various ways. Understanding the resource-use patterns of such communities provides a basis for seeking the participation of such communities in forest conservation. The present study undertaken in the Mudumalai Wildlife Sanctuary and the adjoining Sigur Plateau in the state of Tamil Nadu, India, addressed the importance of forests in the household economy of indigenous communities. Its main objective was to quantify the forest dependence of local people, and assess to what extent restrictive biodiversity conservation strategies would affect their livelihoods. These questions help in understanding the stake of the people in forest conservation strategies. Economic activities of the households were investigated in eight selected villages, four of which (proximal villages) had access to reserve forest areas where collection of forest products was allowed and were also located close to markets that provided opportunities to sell forest products. The remaining four villages (distal villages) were close to the Wildlife Sanctuary where the collection of forest products was not allowed and there was no access to organized markets. A total of 132 households were surveyed. The households both in proximal and distal villages were classified into three distinct income groups namely ‘low’, ‘medium’ and ‘high’, based on their gross annual income. Use of forest resources in Mudumalai was found to be influenced by multiple factors. In terms of livelihood of the traditional communities, livestock rearing and collection of non-wood forest products (NWFPs) were very important, the latter both for cash income and subsistence use. Peripheral communities used the forest resources in a varied fashion, with NWFPs contributing differently to different income groups. Where there was no restriction on forest use, higher income groups used the resources more heavily than lower income groups, and hence would suffer most from any restriction on forest use. People's reliance on forests evidently declined with increased level both of education and of opportunities in non-forestry vocations. Forests were still very important to the household economy of the local people both in terms of food security and cash income.

In the literature of contingent valuation, a rights-based system of environmental ethics claiming that natural objects have absolute rights, has frequently been regarded as the main reason for incommensurability, i.e. for citizens’ inability to find a common measure according to which all values could be ranked. In a study of 2400 Finns aged between 18 and 70, we tested whether a respondent's commitment to guaranteeing private property rights could be a reason for incommensurability beyond the respondent's possible commitment to absolute nature rights. It was found that incommensurability, modelled with lexicographic preferences, was attributable more often to private property rights than to nature rights. However, Finnish respondents who had lexicographic preferences for nature rights based their choice more often on an ethical judgement, whereas lexicographic preferences for property rights could rather be explained with an ambivalent preference construction. Lexicographic preferences for nature rights increased the willingness to pay for conservation, while lexicographic preferences for property rights decreased it. The result, which was predicted by the theory, supported the validity of incommensurability measurement. The study therefore indicates that several reasons for incommensurable preferences may exist and that it is possible to measure these reasons in contingent valuation surveys in order to judge the validity of the welfare measures in environmental policy decision-making.

Although monetary valuation of natural ecosystems is difficult, such valuation helps to draw attention to their importance, and highlight conservation needs, especially in developing countries. The recreational value of Khecheopalri, a lake situated in the West District of Sikkim State, India, which has recreational, biodiversity and sacredness values, was assessed. The demand curve function for recreation increased with decreases in travel cost and distance for Sikkimese visitors. The recreational value of the lake was similar to other protected sites in India; however, all these sites had very low values compared to sites elsewhere in the world. Willingness to pay for maintenance and preservation of the lake by all types of visitors ranged from US$ 0.88 for members of the local community to US$ 7.19 for international tourists. The lake showed high recreational/sacredness values that were attributed to conservation of the site for biodiversity and pilgrimage. A large number of lakes in the Hindu-Kush Himalayan region, if properly managed and marketed for ecotourism, can bring economic development that can be linked with conservation.

Nationally important wintering populations of up to 2700 Pochard Aythya ferina and 2000 Tufted Duck A. fuligula feed around Salford Docks in the upper reaches of the Manchester Ship Canal. The system is grossly organically polluted and devoid of aquatic macrophytes, but holds high densities of oligochaetes and other pollution-tolerant invertebrates. The species fed together and differences in feeding distributions were more apparent between day and night than they were between species or winter period. We related the spatial patterns of feeding by ducks to water depth, channel width, total organic benthic carbon levels, and invertebrate densities. Separate analyses were performed for each species, during nighttime and daytime, and for different periods of the winter. In only half these analyses could feeding patterns be explained by differences in the microhabitat variables. However, feeding by both species was concentrated in the wider portions of the docks, in areas with high densities of oligochaetes, but particularly in areas of high total benthic organic carbon. These were areas where large amounts of sewage matter are deposited in the benthos. There are plans to improve water quality in the docks by modernizing sewage treatment systems upstream and by oxygenating the water within the docks. These may generally improve the biology of the system , but they may have a serious impact on the numbers of diving ducks by reducing the densities of their invertebrate prey.

The rate of forest cover loss in the humid tropics of Cameroon is one of the highest in Central Africa. The aim of the large-scale, two-year research project described here was to understand the effect of the country's economic crisis and policy change on small-scale agricultural systems and land-clearing practices. Hypotheses were tested through surveys of more than 5000 households in 125 villages, and through time-series remote sensing analysis at two sites. The principal findings are that: (1) the rate of deforestation increased significantly in the decade after the 1986 onset of the crisis, as compared to the decade prior to the crisis; (2) the main proximate causes of this change were sudden rural population growth and a shift from production of cocoa and coffee to plantain and other food crops; and (3) the main underlying causes were macroeconomic shocks and structural adjustment policies that led to rural population growth and farming system changes. The implication of this study is that it is necessary to understand and anticipate the undesirable consequences of macroeconomic shocks and adjustment policies for forest cover. Such policies, even though they are often not formulated with natural resource consequences in mind, are often of greater relevance to the fate of forests than forest policy.

The customary tenure of reef areas in many parts of the South Pacific offers an obvious context within which fishery resources might be managed cooperatively between customary-rights owners and fisheries personnel in government, yet the local foundations for such co-management have received little critical attention. Seven customary fishing rights areas (CFRAs) in Fiji were the focus of the present study, the objective being to compare management of CFRAs subject to differing levels of fishing access and ascertain those factors most influential to local management practices. The intensity of access (‘access pressure’) was measured as the number of licences issued per CFRA and per unit area, while management was assessed as an index, based on evidence of five aspects of management (management structure, marshalling of information for management, approach to goodwill payments, management measures and patrolling and enforcement) derived from questionnaires. Management varied amongst the CFRAs, one of the seven being essentially unmanaged because of a breakdown in succession between chiefs. There was little evidence for management responding uniformly to access pressure; rather, two CFRAs evinced a certain management aptitude regardless of this pressure, and two other CFRAs evinced relatively little management although pressure was high. A simple survey technique can indicate useful contrasts amongst CFRAs in functional local management, and thus be useful for guiding decisions about where to make investments in local management or co-management.

The proposed Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the Kyoto Protocol paves the way for financial and technological transfers to support forestry projects that sequester carbon or protect carbon stocks. From its inception, the concept has been highly controversial. It has been enthusiastically supported by those who believe that conservation of tropical forests will be difficult unless forest owners and managers are compensated for the environmental services of their forests. Others believe that financial transfers supporting ‘carbon farming’ would ignore social concerns and the full range of goods and services of forests. This paper examines the implications of CDM for forest conservation and sustainable use, by drawing on recent literature and the results of a policy dialogue with CDM stakeholders. We conclude that initial estimates of the contribution tropical forestry could make to both climate change mitigation and to forest conservation need to be scaled down. CDM payments for tropical forestry are likely to be received in a far more limited area than initially expected. The cost-effectiveness of forestry projects relative to projects in the energy sector may have been overestimated. In particular few estimates have adequately accounted for the likelihood that the duration of CDM forestry projects is unlikely to be as long as the residency time of carbon in the atmosphere. Also political realities and investor priorities may not have been sufficiently understood. CDM funding for forestry may also decline in future as economically viable clean technologies are increasingly developed in the energy sector. Tropical forests are likely to be an intermediate climate change mitigation strategy for buying time, until more permanent options become available. The most important justification for including forests in CDM may lie in the contribution CDM could potentially make to forest conservation and sustainable use. An analysis of the implications of CDM for forests reveals the importance of involving forest stakeholders more closely in the CDM debate. To prevent perverse outcomes and reduce the risk of ‘leakage’ of emission reduction to areas outside project boundaries, CDM projects may need to be limited to niches which meet certain political and institutional preconditions and where sufficient understanding of local decision-making and the broader context is available. CDM may be more effective if used to remove non-economic impediments to forestry activities that are economically viable and meet local needs. Lessons from the forestry sector in relation to plantations, natural forest management, forest conser- vation and non-timber forest products are discussed to illustrate the dangers of misusing CDM and also to give examples of how CDM could be harnessed for better use of forests. CDM should be seen as one more tool for enhancing the effectiveness of more conventional ways of promoting forest conservation and sustainable use.