A/42/427
English
Page 154
Twenty years ago, as we decided to intensify our forest exploitation, we lust thought the resource is available, and we lust took it. At the time, we also thought the intensive selecting out of the trees being cut wouldn't destroy forest regeneration. Because not all of the trees were being cut. But we forgot that we don't know yet about how the tropical forest should be rehabilitated.
An indigenous species such as metanti, I don't know the name in English, metanti, rami, is our high-valued wood, a timber that cannot make a shadow in its particular period of growth. And it cannot survive without that shadow. And we still didn't think about it, we just accepted the technology from the West that we have to cut, to exploit our forest.
Emmy H. Dharsono
NGO Network for
Forest Conservation
WCED Public Hearing
Jakarta, 26 March 1985
considerable stress for all ecosystems. making it particularly important that natural diversity be maintained as a means of adaptation.
III. SOME CAUSES OF EXTINCTION
22. The tropics, which host the greatest number and diversity of species, also host most developing nations, where population growth is fastest and poverty is most widespread. If farmers in these countries are forced to continue with extensive agriculture, which is inherently unstable and leads to constant movement, then farming will tend to spread throughout remaining wildlife environments. But if they are helped and encouraged to practise more intensive agriculture, they could make productive use of relatively limited areas, with less impact on wildlands.
23. They will need help: training, marketing support, and fertilizers, pesticides, and tools they can afford. This will require the full support of governments, including ensuring that conservation policies are designed with the benefit of agriculture foremost in mind. It may be expedient to stress the value to farmers rather than to wildlife of this programme, but in fact the destinies of the two are intertwined. Species conservation is tied to development, and the problems of both are more political than technical.
24. Population growth is a major threat to conservation efforts in many developing nations. Kenya has allocated 6 per cent of its territory as parks and reserves in order to protect its wildlife and to earn foreign exchange through tourism. But Kenya's present population of 20 million people is already
