For thousands of years, Papua New Guinea’s affluent terrestrial vegetations have provided the habitat and the patronage elements that were essential for the survival of the Papuan people (Map I) (Worldatlas.com, 2012) (Nicholls, 2004). The diversity of Papua New Guinea’s (PNG) terrestrial vegetation are portrayed in beach grasses, located along coastal lines, moving inland towards lowland tropical rainforest (LTF), and ending with mountaintops’ alpine forests (Table I) (Nicholls, 2004). PNG’s lowland tropical rainforest dominates large portions of the country’s landscape, and it is considered to be the richest region in biodiversity, timber, and minerals (Swartzendruber, 1993). This latter notion has resulted in a profound-reciprocal-bond that continues to exist between the Papuan people and their surrounding environment in general, and specifically biologically rich lowland forest formations. This Papuan rainforest is divergent in appearance, and it extends from areas below 500-1000 meters to reach 3000 m. above see level, where it receives rainfalls that range between 2500 and 3500 mm per annum (Schaffer, 2012). Additionally, the forest’s canopy trees tend to have straight trunks, and extend over large areas, with heights ranging between 50 and 25 m (Schaffer, 2012). At lower altitudes, thin topsoil formations are abundant, which favor buttress root trees to evolve and dictate the forests’ ecosystem (Schaffer, 2012). The vast majority of the Papuan people (87 % of the population) reside in rural areas where they rely upon the LTF for agriculture, hunting, and gathering as means for survival (Nicholls, 2004). Needless to say, the occurrence of feasibly-abundant forest resources have extend the benefits and values of Papua’s LTR far beyond their sustenance role to the indigenous population, to include benefits that are financial, social, and environmental in nature. Sequentially, the compound benefits and uses provided by PNG’s LTR have caught the attention of different groups of stakeholders, each of which represents a unique-well-sounded management perspective that well define their own interest in the forest. With that in mind, three major stakeholder groups are believed to be involved in managing PNG’s LTR – foreign investors, local government, and environmentalist groups. The existing ties between these different groups’ involvements and the forest’s benefits in turn create land use tradeoffs that produce contentions among those groups involved. The variation in perspectives among those multiple stakeholder groups brings forward the need to objectively evaluate PNG LTR’s benefits and values from the viewpoint of each group. Simultaneously, addressing the differences in perspectives on ways of managing this forest landscape shall in turn paint a clear picture that better describes the sustainable future of PNG’s LTR.
Moeller, Karla (2013, July 24). Revealing the Rainforest. ASU - Ask A Biologist. Retrieved November 29, 2013 from http://askabiologist.asu.edu/explore/rainforest
The major functions of the rain forest is they help stabilize the world’s climate, provide home to many plants, animals, and even people, and protect against floods, droughts, or erosions. Tropical rain forests have a characteristic structure that is made up of a number of vertical layers that reach up from the forest floor to the very tops of the tallest trees (Unknown). The major layers of the rain forest are the ground, canopy, understory, and overstory level. Each level have their own plant and species that may live t...
The conflict in the North Vancouver district is over the resource of land and how to use it. There are many stake holders involved in this conflict. The district owns the Mountain Forest and Cove Forest areas, and wanted to develop the areas in response to projected increases in future populations, taken from the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD) reports. The individual residents of the district are also stake holders. As taxpaying members of the municipality they indirectly own the land. They are also stake holders from the point of view of citizens who live near the proposed development sites and use the forests for its recreation and aesthetic values. Other stake holders include the Lower Mainland residents; many of these people use the North Shore Mountains, and in particular Mountain and Cove Forests, for their outdoor recreation activities. If the land was to be developed they too would be affected.2
Tropical rain forests and temperate forests are two different types of forests. They differ in density, diversity of species, regions, altitudes and their usefulness to humans. This usefulness is referred to as values. The values obtained from forests are aesthetics, scientific and educational purposes. In addition forests have the ability to absorb and store carbon dioxide released into the air from man’s endeavours. This CO2 contributes to the sudden increase in global warming. The total value of a forest ecosystem is the combined value of each individual species living within that habitat.
The Boreal Forest and Tropical Rainforest are two important and crucial biomes on the planet. They are a necessary part of an ecosystem that sustains plant and animal life. In understanding these biomes, it helps researchers and the public become more aware of the delicate balance needed for their continued survival and also, their protection from increasing anthropogenic activities. Given the global impact of these biomes, it is important to understand as much as we can.
...lts in an increasing population of non-native species, which in turn might oppose a threat in the years to come to the number of the native specie populations of the islands. Zimmerman et al. described that the islands’ “forests seem to be balancing between two opposing factors”, meaning that the native and the non-native plants are competing for space in their common ecosystem (1).
Tropical rainforests have been around for approximately 400 million years (Knight, 2004: para.1), they inhibit about 50% of all the living things on Earth including flora and fauna (RFUS, 2014: para.2). They also produce 40% of the Earth’s oxygen (Schaffner, 2010: para.3), although these rainforests only take up 6-7% of the Earth’s land surface; they are referred as ‘The Lungs of the Earth’ (SYW, 2010: para.2)
Governments in these countries need to stop thinking of forests as a renewable resource. The rate at which they are harvesting these areas drives them beyond the boundaries of sustainability. The efforts required by reforestation may not initially be cost effective, but it will result in not only the survivability of the environment, but of the country’s economy. Widespread awareness of these ideas will help fight against the natural human tendency towards instant gratification and short-term goals. Different methods of logging can be utilized to allow the rainforests to survive and regrow naturally and at a sustainable
Over the centuries the Enga people of Papua New Guinea have adapted certain cultural characteristics to cope with varying environmental and social changes. Some aspects of the Enga peopleís lives that have shown the most cultural adaptation to the surrounding ecosystem are their horticultural practices, system of tribal warfare and clan organization. Through these adaptations, the Enga have gained ways to regulate their population, reduce their risk, control, communal resources, and regulate the environment through rituals. In our paper, we will look at each of these aspects of Enga culture and how they allow the Enga people to live within the environment constraints they are faced with.
In Indonesia, 8.828 million hectares of forests have been destroyed (see appendix 2). Around fifty acres of forests are removed every minute, not o...
More than 90 percent of primate species live in African, Asian, and Neotropic rain forests. Any outside force that alters the size and structure of these forests will directly affect primate populations. The major players that cause habitat...
Rainforests once covered 14% of the worlds land surface, however now it only covers a mere 6%. It is estimated that all rainforests could be consumed in less than 40 years. Trees are becoming more needed and used everyday. We need them cut down for many reasons such as paper and timber, while also needing them ‘untouched’ for other reasons like oxygen, we have to ask ourselves, which is more important? At the current rate, most of the rainforests are being cut down for resources like paper and timber, but less importance is being placed on main resources like oxygen.
Thesis: Forests provide the earth with a regulated climate, strong biodiversity, and good nutrient rich soil for plants to strive on.
On the one hand, participatory approach to land use planning can provide openings for the decentralized administration of land management and enhance legal protection of local land rights through contributing to formal recognition of existing land tenure systems. According to Chigbu et al, (2015) four functions of land use planning that directly links to tenure security. (1) Its capacity to identify or determine land areas, parcels and uses and users. (2) Its propensity to enable documentation of land areas, parcels, rights, restrictions and responsibilities. (3) The opportunities it provides for stakeholder involvement, compensation of claims and community participation. (4) Its impact on land value, land markets and credit opportunities. On the other hand, land use planning, promoting sustainable natural resource use and environmental management are generally part of the mandate of local governments. And these prerogatives often tend to be weakly developed, both legally and with respect to capacity building and methodology (Hilhorst 2010). Unclear property rights and tenure insecurity are the major constraints to the potential of successful land use planning. According to UN-Habitat (2008, p. 17), poor land use planning associated with insecurity of tenure and incompletely specified land rights leads to problems of air and water-borne pollution from agricultural and industrial land use. Though there is a
Papua New Guinea has an abundant amount of animals and plants life. It actually has one of the largest variety of both in the whole world. According to WWF, about 10 percent of the world’s vertebrates are located on the island and there are such remote ares deep in the rain-forests that still were never been thoroughly explored. Just in 2009, few new species of frogs and plants were found there together with two new mammals, and about 100 new species of insects (treehugger.com). The country also has many natural resources such as oil, natural gas, gold, silver, copper and has a large amount of tre...