REDD+ and Ecosystem Services: Relevance to the Forestry Profession

Abstract

Significant conversion of forestland to nonforest use is of fundamental concern to the forestry profession. The world's forests are estimated to have occupied 14 billion acres in 1700, about 44% of the world's land area (Ramankutty and Foley 1999) and by 1990 forests occupied 10.3 billion acres of land (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations [FAO] 2010). From 1990 to 2010, about 16.6 million acres per year, an area larger than the State of West Virginia, were converted to nonforest use (FAO 2010). The extent of degradation in the tropics is less well documented but still considered to have a widespread and significant impact on the forest (Asner et al. 2009).

Citation

Elias, Patricia E.; Heath, Linda S. 2015. REDD+ and Ecosystem Services: Relevance to the Forestry Profession. Journal of Forestry 113(2): 268-270. https://doi.org/10.5849/jof.14-107.