Track: Ecology, Conservation, and Archaeology
World Forest Monitoring by Network of Indigenous Peoples
Vladimir N. BocharnikovSergei M. KRASNOPEEV
The last years of this century have witnessed worldwide emergencies in relation to two major topics: the environment and human rights. Deforestation and forest degradation pose a serious problem in some parts of the world. This is important to consider especially at sites where there are indigenous and aboriginal communities. Traditional people have particular values and perceptions of the forest, the forest being for them a resource necessary for life and a major element of their culture. Seventeen indigenous peoples whose life mode, culture, and traditions are related to nature live in the Russian far east. Over the Soviet epoch, the majority of people have been subject to irreversible changes in their attitude to ward their use of natural products and conservation. There is a need to identify and consider ways to address the underlying causes of deforestation, forest degradation, and difficulties in implementing sustainable forest management, with particular attention to indigenous lands. New mechanisms and technologies should be established to ensure the equal participation of indigenous peoples and forest-dependent peoples in decision making for sustainable forest management in vast, nearly pristine areas of the Russian far east. All institutions and mechanisms established for monitoring and assessment of forest and land use plans must include the special designed information system as part of involvement of indigenous and other forest-dependent peoples at regional decision making. Within the framework of national and regional plans, decisions on land use must be devolved to the local level so that the indigenous can assert effective customary systems of sustainable forest management. The support indigenous forest network would provide information for the process of identifying a core data set to meet global forest-related monitoring needs. Its function would serve both national and international initiatives in forest monitoring and forest assessments such as the GFRA 2000. It demonstrates an example of an application program on the basis of ArcView GIS, MapObjects, and Paradox software.
Vladimir N. Bocharnikov
Pacific Institute of Geography
7 Radio St
Vladivostok, 690041
RUSSIA
Telephone: +7(4232)312857
Fax: +7(4232)312159
E-mail: sergeikr@online.vladivostok.ru