![spacer](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20090118204704im_/http://www.ehponline.org/siteimages/transpixel.gif)
| | ![spacer](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20090118204704im_/http://www.ehponline.org/siteimages/transpixel.gif) | | ![spacer](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20090118204704im_/http://www.ehponline.org/siteimages/transpixel.gif) |
Book Review / New Books
|
|
|
![spacer](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20090118204704im_/http://www.ehponline.org/siteimages/transpixel.gif) |
Book Review
War and Tropical Forests: Conservation in Areas of Armed Conflict
Edited by Steven V. Price
New York:Food Products Press (Haworth Press), 2003. 219 pp.
ISBN: 1-56022-098-8, $49.95 cloth;
ISBN: 1-56022-099-6, $24.95 paper
This well-organized collection of essays represents the first systematic effort to determine the impact of war and civil strife on tropical forest conservation. Tropical forests are vastly important for the conservation of biodiversity in general, because they may be home to more than half the world's species. Moreover, these species are the most poorly known anywhere; even disregarding bacteria and other prokaryotic organisms and using the most conservative estimates, their associated plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms consist of 4-5 million species, with no more than 1 in 10 even having been given a scientific name.
![May book cover](maybookcover.jpg) | image credit: Arnold Greenwell/EHP |
Although we all wish it were otherwise, civil strife and war have characterized our overcrowded world, with its unsustainable dreams of increased human consumption and prosperity. Almost all tropical forests occur in the less-developed nations, and they are being exploited ruthlessly by the citizens of these countries and especially by the seemingly insatiable desire for their valuable resources in the richer nations.
The need to conserve these forests and their biota continues both in war and in peace. Once they are gone, we have no way, ever, to get them back. So what strategies should be adopted by those who are devoted to conserving them? Building bridges is necessary in both war and peace, and as Annette Lanjouw brings out so well, there is much room for collaboration among relief, conservation, and development organizations, which have methods, goals, and objectives in common. Jeff McNeeley, drawing on his vast experience in tropical conservation, emphasizes not only that armed conflict can often rapidly exhaust resources used by the combatants, but that peace--often accompanied by the nationalization of resources and the disenfranchisement of indigenous people--can be even worse. Bushmeat poaching may be especially intense during armed conflict, and such animal populations may have no opportunity to recover. Often, relatively pristine natural areas are offered to the combatants once peace is attained, and intense exploitation often follows. David Kaimowitz and Angelica Fauné offer a particular fascinating account of the way this process has been working since the end of the civil war in Nicaragua.
Because many threatened forests lie along international boundaries, international cooperation will often be necessary to achieve a particular conservation objective. All countries except the United States, Iraq, and Iran have now ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity, which, as McNeely points out, affords a useful framework for international efforts in conservation, given the legal obligations of the countries that have adhered to the treaty.
Indonesia, where the military has exploited forests for timber, continues--as one of the world's outstanding megadiversity countries--to present problems that are especially intractable. Conservationists there, as Charles Barber and Kirk Talbott conclude, can be effective only if they link with development and reform advocacy groups.
In his case study of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where major conservation efforts were under way when the hostilities intensified, Andrew Plumptre discusses the importance of junior staff members, who often have the ability and the will to hold together conservation efforts even under extreme and dangerous situations. Unlike senior staff, they are likely to be well accepted by the population at large, including the combatants, and may then find ways to carry on with their work.
Whether legal remedies can be found on the cessation of hostilities is the subject of a concluding essay by Jay Austin and Carl Bruch. The concept is relatively new, but there have been some promising developments. Ultimately, dedicated conservationists must find ways to continue their efforts during periods of war and civil unrest; as they do so, they will find a considerable amount of wisdom in this interesting book, with all of its diverse approaches to the problems encountered.
Peter H. Raven
Peter H. Raven is director of the Missouri Botanical Garden and Engelmann Professor of Botany at Washington University in St. Louis, MO. He has been a lifelong advocate of conservation throughout the world, especially in developing countries.
New Books
-
A Bridge Not Attacked: Chemical Warfare Civilian Research During World War II
Harold Johnston
Singapore:World Scientific Publishing Co., 2004. 276 pp. ISBN: 981-238-152-X, $50 -
A Guide to Practical Toxicology: Evaluation, Prediction and Risk
Adam Woolley
London:Taylor & Francis, 2003. 312 pp. ISBN: 0-7484-0923-8, $59.95 -
AIDS in Asia
Yichen Lu, Max Essex, eds.
Hingham, MA:Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004. 736 pp. ISBN: 0-306-48483-8, $175 -
Air Pollution Impacts on Crops and Forests: A Global Assessment
Lisa Emberson, Mike Ashmore, Frank Murray, eds.
London:Imperial College Press, 2003. 388 pp. ISBN: 1-86094-292-X, $82 -
An Air That Kills
Andrew Schneider, David McCumber
New York:G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2004. 434 pp. ISBN: 0-399-15095-1, $25.95 -
Chemical Pesticides: Mode of Action and Toxicology
Jorgen Stenersen
Boca Raton, FL:CRC Press, 2004. 296 pp. ISBN: 0-7484-0910-6, $79.95 -
Environment in the New Global Economy
Peter M. Haas, ed.
Williston, VT:Edward Elgar Publishing, Inc., 2003. 1,304 pp. ISBN: 1-84064-075-8, $475 -
Geology and Health: Closing the Gap
H. Catherine W. Skinner, Antony R. Berger, eds.
New York:Oxford University Press, 2003. 171 pp. ISBN: 0-19-516204-8, $75 -
Immonotoxicology of Drugs and Chemicals
J. Descotes
Burlington, MA:Elsevier, 2004. 400 pp. ISBN: 0-444-51093-1, $167.50 -
Mechanisms of Carcinogenesis
Patricia Buffler, Jerry Rice, Robert Baan, Michael Bird, Paolo Boffeta, eds.
Lyon, France:IARC Press, 2004. 450 pp. ISBN: 92-832-2157-5, $40 -
Metal Ions and Neurodegenerative Disorders
Paolo Zatta, ed.
Singapore:World Scientific Publishing Co., 2003. 508 pp. ISBN: 981-238-398-0, $84 -
Organic Metal and Metalloid Species in the Environment
Alfred V. Himer, Hendrik Emons, eds.
New York:Springer-Verlag, 2004. 328 pp. ISBN: 3-540-20829-1, $129 -
Phytoremediation: Transformation and Control of Contaminants
Steve C. McCutcheon, Jerald L. Schnoor, eds.
Hoboken, NJ:Wiley-Interscience, Inc., 2003. 924 pp. ISBN: 0-471-39435-1, $115 -
State of the World 2004
Worldwatch Institute
New York:W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004. 234 pp. ISBN: 0-393-05860-3, $16.95 -
The Effects of Air Pollution on the Built Environment
Peter Brimblecombe, ed.
London:Imperial College Press. 2003. 448 pp. ISBN: 1-86094-291-1, $46 -
The Forgotten Revolution: How Science Was Born in 300 BC and Why It Had To Be Reborn
Lucio Russo, Silvio Levy
New York:Springer-Verlag, 2004. 487 pp. ISBN: 3-540-20396-6, $39.95 -
The Human Genome: A User's Guide, 2nd Ed.
Julia E. Richards, Scott Hawley
Burlington, MA:Academic Press, 2004. 460 pp. ISBN: 0-12-333462-4, $49.95 -
The Iraq War and Its Consequences: Thoughts of Nobel Peace Laureates and Eminent Scholars
Irwin Abrams, Wang Gungwu, eds.
Singapore:World Scientific Publishing Co., 2003. 464 pp. ISBN: 981-238-588-6, $65 -
Ultrafine Particles in the Atmosphere
L.M. Brown, N. Collings, R.M. Harrison, A.D. Maynard, R.l. Maynard, eds.
London:Imperial College Press World Scientific, 2003. 320 pp. ISBN: 1-86094-358-6, $74 -
Unnatural Disasters
Angus M. Gunn
Westport, CT:Greenwood Press, 2003. 139 pp. ISBN: 0-313-31999-5, $55
[Table of Contents]
Last Updated: April 20, 2004 |
|
![spacer](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20090118204704im_/http://www.ehponline.org/siteimages/transpixel.gif) |
|
| |