1. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Tropical deforestation
Local solutions for global problems
Luis Santamaria

2. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Tropical areas represent the largest remaining tracts of
continuous pristine forested habitats (together with the boreal
region).

3. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Tropical deforestation leads to reductions in biodiversity,
disturbed ecosystems services (e.g. water regulation, soil
conservation) and the destruction of livelihoods for many of the
world’s poorest.
Kindermann et al. (2008) PNAS

4. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
The humid tropics is where the modern extinction crisis will
have the greatest effect
They host 60% of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity hotspots,
and contain the highest number of threatened species overall.
Coupled with accelerated rates of global change, the higher
extinction proneness and greater concentrations of tropical
biodiversity predict increasingly severe species losses.
Brook et al. (2011)

5. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Global deforestation produces between 12
to 20% of global greenhouse gases, about
equal to the emissions from the entire
global transport sector.
Amazonia generates 27% of this.
Kindermann et al. (2008)

6. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
SC America host as much tropical forest as Africa and SE Asia
together. Under current deforestation rates, SE Asia will have
virtually no forest by the end of the century.
Cramer et al.
(2004)

7. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
SE Asia show the world’s highest
deforestation rate:
2 to 8 times higher than Africa or America.
Effect of
1997-8
fires
INPE / Miettinen etal. (2011)

8. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Despite having much less forest, SE Asia
shows C emission rates comparable to or
higher than those of C-S America
Cramer et al. (2004)

9. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Deforestation
Climate
change
Scenarios for the combined effect
of land-use change and climate
change by 2100
Asner et al. (2010)

10. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Main drivers of deforestation
Amazonia SE Asia
Cattle ranches 65-70% Oil palm plantations
Agriculture 25-35% Rubber plantations
Logging, legal and illegal 2-3% Logging, legal and illegal
Other 1-2% Other

11. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
The Amazonian case
In the Amazonia, deforestation increased steeply from 1990 to
2004, but it has decreased since then.
Is this a temporary decrease, or does it reflect a long-term
change in deforestation dynamics?

12. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
35
Deforestation rate (1000 km2)
30
25
20
15
10
Changes to Brazil's
Forest Code
5
0
1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

13. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
35 5.0
Deforestation rate (1000 km2)
30 4.50
Brazil's per capita GDP
25 4.0
20 3.50
15 3.0
10 2.50
5 2.0
0 1.50
1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

14. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
ENSO warm (El Niño) ENSO cold (La Niña)

15. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
35 5.0
Deforestation rate (1000 km2)
30 4.50
Brazil's per capita GDP
25 4.0
20 3.50
15 3.0
10 2.50
5 2.0
0 1.50
1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

16. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
After 2004, a vertiginous drop in clearing seemed to be
occurring and the zero-clearingn target (“desmatemento
zero”) became a credible idea in Brazil’s policy circles.
How did this transformation come about and is it durable?
1.The “Politics of Agreement”: convergence of all the
environmentalisms.
2.Controlling deforestation in Amazonia: the politics of multiple
environmentalisms.
3.Governments, Governance and Governmentality
Hecht (2011)

17. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
1. The Politics of Agreement
- Empirical baseline : science based information on the
magnitude and location of clearing, produced in timely
usable ways.
- Emergence of climate change as a national political concern.
- The “rules of the game” were agreed to:
•All sectors agreed on the use of regulations (Forest Code), state
powers (national environmental agency, state agencies) and local
social institutions to enforce deforestation laws.
•Local social institutions and decentralized strategies (at municipal and
state levels) were supported for controlling clearing.
•Market mechanisms were mobilized to enhance alternatives to
clearing (ranging from intensification of agriculture/agroforestry, to
payment for environmental services).
Hecht (2011)

18. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
2. The Politics of Multiple Environmentalisms
Varying approaches for controlling deforestation:
- Conservation set asides and the fragmented forest.
- Inhabited forest: extractive reserves (traditional peoples)
and indigenous reserves.
- The Social Forest: Reimagining the Matrix.
- The Globalized Arc of Fire: the soy frontier.
Hecht (2011)

19. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
3. Governments, Governance and Governmentality
- The deforestation Panopticon.
Command-and-control form of compliance to legal norms, facilitated by
surveillance technology.
- Governmentality, Environmentality and the Creation of
Environmental Citizens.
- Global governance.
International pressure on the beef and ranch frontiers.
The golbalization of Amazon taste.
Hecht (2011)

20. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
SE Asia
SE Asia is a hot spot for biodiversity but is undergoing
widespread change.
Its global markets are growing, as is large-scale agricultural
business.
Large extensions of primary forest are being turned into oil-
palm and rubber-tree plantations.

21. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Parallels with Amazonia:
1. The role of agricultural commodities
Primary forests were the source of nearly 60% of new plantations
established in Southeast Asia between 1980 and 2000.
Gibbs et al. (2010)
In 1990–2005, more than half of oil-palm development in
Malaysia and Indonesia had resulted in deforestation.
Koh & Wilcove (2008)

22. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
2. C emissions and fire dynamics
The tremendous amounts of carbon stored in the region’s forests
and peatlands are being swept to the atmosphere. To these, we
must add the loss of C-uptake capacity in these ecosystems - and
the catastrophic spread of fires during dry years.
E.g. in 1997-1998, fires burned some 9.7 million hectares of forest
and non-forest land, caused estimated economic damage of
more than 9 billion dollars and released 0.8-2.5 gigatons of
carbon into the atmosphere.

23. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
3. A strong influence of El Niño…
There is a clear link between drought, deforestation and carbon
emissions.
In 2006, the climate was 3 times drier in the region than it was in
2000, and the carbon emissions were 30 times greater –
exceeding emissions from fossil fuel burning.
In a dry climate, fires are easier to
set. Land managers respond to the
drought by using fire to clear more
land. In dry years, they burn deeper
into the forest, releasing more
carbon dioxide.

24. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
… that extends to forest dynamics…
Dipterocarp reproduction is tied to the arrival of El Niño: most
species synchronize their flowering to the onset of dry weather.
By reducing the local density and biomass of mature trees below
critical thresholds that limit masting, logging may disrupt this
reproductive cycle.
Forest triggered by dry conditions may restrict further seed
recruitment, and drought stress on seedlings, saplings and adults.
Curran et al. (1999)

25. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
… suggesting that changes in logging practices may be advisable
Constrains to dipterocarp reproduction linked to threshold size for
masting put into question current selective-logging
practices, based on a minimum-size threshold for all species (45-
cm DBH).
Comparable policies, used e.g. for fisheries and sport-hunting
regulation, are currently being revised worldwide owing the
introduction of undesired demographic and evolutionary effects
(e.g. Darimont et al. 2009, Santamaría & Méndez 2011).

26. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
4. Peat swamp ecosystems, which store large amounts
of carbon in the soil…

27. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
…have been extensively cleared…
In Peninsular Malaysia, Borneo and Sumatra, the extent of
cleared peatlands (2.3 million ha) more than doubles the land
area under oil-palm cultivation (≈880,000 ha).
The unplanted clearings that remain are under increasing threat
of conversion, particularly if cleared peatlands were to be
considered “degraded lands” by land-use policymakers.
Koh et al. 2011

28. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
…and will be further degraded if turned into oil-palm
Biodiversity outcomes of land-use transition scenarios for cleared peatlands
plantations.
Koh et al. 2011

29. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
The role of secondary forest
Secondary forests show a reasonable recovery of biodiversity
within moderate time frames (years to decades).
Successional influx of different taxa into secondary forests
of different ages (Chazdon, 2009).

30. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Hence, they may represent good opportunities for forest-
ecosystem recovery, provided that:
1. Older, more species-rich secondary forests near protected
areas are given priority
2. Secondary forest re expanded nearby old-growth forests and
riparian zones, and used to established biological corridors.
3. Areas where regeneration is slow or inhibited become
priorities for assisted
regeneration, reforestation, agroforestry, or sustainable
agriculture.
4. Monitoring programs are developed and framed into adaptive
management practices.

31. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Summary of comparison
Amazonia SE Asia
Empirical baseline Incipient, largely academic
Climate change as national concern Weak
Rules of the game agreed to Weak
Set asides Most Parks
Sustainable reserves Present (?)
Sustanaible management of fragment-matrix
Preliminary experiences.
mosaic
Intensification-for-conservation Under-developed
Absent. Difficult to implement
State Panopticon
(ASEAN?)
Governmentality and Environmentality Absent (?)
Global governance Moderate

32. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Questions?
Comments?
lsantamaria@imedea.uib-csic.es

33. The sustainability and conservation of Malaysian forests Kuala Lumpur 14/09/2011
Acknowledgements