Development of an International
Forest Management Training Center in the Brazilian Amazon - the Instituto
Floresta Tropical
Forest Industry and Policy Design in the Brazilian
Amazon
Designing Forest Incentives Policies in Chile:
Micro and Macroeconomic Effects
Large Scale Ecosystem Model for
the Brazilian Amazon
An Analysis of the Mahogany
Markets in the United States
A Study of Land Conversion from
Forest to Pasture in the Bolivian Lowlands
Development of a Timber Market
Newsletter for Brazil
Development of an International
Forest Management Training Center in the Brazilian Amazon - the Instituto
Floresta Tropical.
Project Dates: 2001-2003
Project Collaborators: Fundação Floresta Tropical, US Forest Service
International Programs.
In this project, Virginia Tech is providing
expert consultation on the proposal development, business plan, and
first phase of a permanent forest management training center in the
Brazilian Amazon. This center - to be called the Instituto Floresta
Tropical, will expand upon the current work undertaken by the Fundação
Floresta Tropical (FFT). FFT is the Brazilian subsidiary of the Tropical
Forest Foundation - a U.S.-based environmental NGO - and has been
an important source of trained forestry personnel and a leader in
the development of Reduced Impact Logging for the Amazon. The support
provided by Virginia Tech encompasses proposal writing, curriculum
development, and start-up management.
Forest Industry and Policy Design
in the Brazilian Amazon
Project Dates: 2002-2004
Collaborators: Woods Hole Research Center & Instituto de Pesquisa
Ambiental da Amazônia.
This project aims at an assessment of
the timber industry, and an evaluation of the most effective policies
to curb deforestation, through three complimentary sub-objectives.
The first is an extension-type activity with individual mills in return
for the compiling and submitting cost data, during which time we will
assist the sawmills owners in accounting for their production costs.
The second is estimation of stochastic efficiency frontiers for the
industry. These frontiers will depend on mill location, type, and
market characteristics. The third sub-objective is an evaluation of
the impacts forest policies have on mill efficiency and wood use.
The impetus will be to find the most efficient means with which to
reduce wood dependence and associated frontier deforestation.
Designing Forest Incentives Policies
in Chile: Micro and Macroeconomic Effects
Project Dates: 1996-1998
Project Collaborators: The World Bank, ILADES
The purpose of this project was to propose
a new way to design forest incentives when governments face revenue
constraints, and when incentives affect the distribution of both private
(timber) and public (nontimber) goods produced in the economy. Policies
targeting both the forest stock and those targeting prices were examined.
A model of second best was used to determine how government budgets
affect the optimal targeting of policies, in a setting where forest
policies may shift land from native forests to plantations. Macroeconomic
impacts of forest incentives were assessed by determining their impact
on exchange rates and exports. The model was tested using a time series
cross section data set for several regions and 25 years of data.
Large Scale Ecosystem Model for the
Brazilian Amazon
Project Timetable: 2002-2004
Project Collaborators: Woods Hole Research Center & Instituto
de Pesquisa Ambiental da Amazônia
In this project, the International Forestry
Center of Virginia Tech is providing research collaboration with Woods
Hole and IPAM in a large-scale ecosystem model of the Brazilian Amazon.
The research results from the Forest Industry and Policy project listed
above will be incorporated into a large multi-faceted model that examines
the impact of changes in the forest sector (among many other parameters)
on the ecosystem of the Amazon.
An Analysis of the Mahogany Markets
in the United States
Project Timetable: 2002
The harvest and sale of mahogany has been
at the forefront of timber expansion throughout Latin America and
Africa. And, although there has been extensive research in the ecology
of mahogany, there has been little empirical analysis of the mahogany
markets. In this project, the market for mahogany imported into the
US is analyzed. Mahogany import data to the US from 1976 to 2000 is
used to determine whether mahogany is differentiated by country of
origin. This is a first step in the process of developing more complete
market models for mahogany. These models will then be used to develop
policy recommendations for the long-term conservation of the mahogany
resource.
A Study of Land Conversion from Forest
to Pasture in the Bolivian Lowlands
Project Timetable: 1999 - 2001
Project Collaborators: Bolivian Sustainable Forest Management Project,
BOLFOR
With the reduction of land under forest
concessions from 20 to six million hectares following the enactment
of the 1996 forest law, the Bolivian Government faces the daunting
task of overseeing new dimensions in land use in the Lowlands. There
is an uncertain future for the much of the land formerly in forest
concession and there is concern that some will be converted to uses
other than forestry. The most likely land use alternative is pasture
for cattle ranching. Using a multi-year linear programming model this
project examines regional differences in land conversion susceptibility
and the effect of increasing stumpage values on land conversion rates.
Preliminary results suggest that there are regional differences in
land conversion and that - contrary to current opinion - higher stumpage
values can sometimes lead to more land conversion from forests to
pasture.
Development of a Timber Market Newsletter
for Brazil
Project Timetable: January 2002 through July 2002
Project Collaborators: IMAZON
In conjunction with IMAZON (the Institute
of People and the Environment) IFC is developing a market newsletter
for the tropical wood markets of Brazil. Brazil is the largest consumer
of tropical hardwood in the world, yet there is little available market
information for lumber producers. This project aims to improve the
information available to timber producers by creating a list of prices
for important products in the major wood markets of Brazil. Although
the initial project is for one copy of the newsletter, it is expected
that it will create a demand for this information and that the project
will develop into a series of quarterly price reports.
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