The Importance Of Sustainable Forest Management

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A forest is defined by Botkin & Keller (2011) as a major kind of landscape that is normally grown over certain amounts of years and then harvested, forest products are mostly subjected to vigorous commercialization. Forests are also known for their important contribution to biological conservation. Forests have been an integral part of people and civilization from the very earliest centuries for their major product which his wood. Wood began to be viewed as an important building resource at the start of civilization. This was because wood was always easily and readily available and accessible. With wood, people built their houses, boats and even used it for heating up their homes. Amongst many reasons why people value the importance of forests,
(2016) defines sustainable forest management as a process or an approach of managing forests with an aim of achieving various objectives of management which are clearly defined or specified in terms of continuously producing desired forest products and services without unduly decreasing its inherent values and future productivity and also without imposing negative effects on the physical and social environment. One of the main challenges which is facing many forest policies and planning entails conciliating many different interests and finding a balance so as to satisfy the economical requests without jeopardising the integrity of forests ecological functions (Corezzola, 2016). This is said to be of greatest importance for the concept of Sustainable Forest Management (SFM). In a broader clarity of the SFM definition it can be mentioned that it is “an approach that balances environmental, socio-cultural and economic objectives of management in line with the Forest Principles adopted at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED1) in 1992” (FAO 2003 in Matteusi, 2016). In another broader definition, Sustainable forest management refers to the ‘‘stewardship and use of forests and forest land in a way, and at a rate, that maintains their biodiversity, productivity, generation capacity, vitality, and their potential to fulfil relevant ecological, economic, and social functions at local, national, and global levels for current and future generations” (FAO 2003 in Matteusi,

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