Excerpt
“Or consider that it has been at least a decade since federal agencies began addressing ecosystem management as a new mandate for agency decision-making. Yet there remains no explicit political ratification of ecosystem management for federal land management.”
With the forestry moving into its second century in the United States, it might seem that many of the questions and issues facing the profession would have been resolved or at least comprehensively addressed by now. And in some cases that is in fact the case. Certainly, the potential effects of forestry on the natural environment, and the roles that the active management of forests can play in meeting various societal goals have been scientifically scrutinized for decades. But as a rule, it seems that very few forestry questions can be laid to rest with any glimmer of permanence.
Insofar as forest policy in concerned, it seems as though the issues continue to swirl unabated. The rate at which forest policy questions are settled seems unable to keep up with the rate at which new questions arise. For example, the spotted owl situation in the Pacific Northwest during the late 1980s and early 1990s focused unprecedented attention on the role that forests …
Footnotes
Michael J. Mortimer is a professor of forest law and policy at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.
- Copyright 2006 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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