Environmental Possibilism and Determinism

ENVIRONMENTAL POSSIBILISM AND DETERMINISM

by Antonio C. Antonio

December 26, 2012

“Adapting Forests and Their Management to Climate Change” by Pierre Bernier and Dieter Schoene is a very informative article on the different aspects of sustainable forest management in consonance with environmental determinism and environmental possibilism.  Let us first define “environmental determinism and possibilism” before we try to relate them to Forests and Forest Management Practices.  Environmental determinism is a theory that says that human culture, institutions and economic activities are shaped or are determined by the environment while environmental possibilism is a theory that states that the environment does not shape human behavior but the environment only presents different conditions to allow humans to behave the way they do.

FACTS AND REALITIES: 

In the article, Bernier and Schoene presented some facts which became the basis for their subsequent recommendations.  These facts and realities are:

1.  The health of many forest ecosystems is already affected by climate change.
2. Climate change is due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere.
3. Forests have 2 functions that influence climate change: (1) as sources of greenhouse gases when forests are destroyed and (2) as sinks for carbon when they grow or expand.
4. Millions of indigenous forest dwellers depend directly on forests for their livelihood and forests contribute to human well-being through a well-known range of goods and services available in them.
5. It is difficult to determine the frequency of extreme climatic events due to the absence of long-term, reliable records.  And starting an extensive documentation is very expensive.
6. The impacts of future climate change on health, growth, distribution and composition of specific forests cannot be predicted with certainty.
7. Richer societies in industrialized countries have the means for dealing with the more immediate effects of climate change and are less prone to suffer in the short term.
8. The economic and human welfare impact of climate change can be severe for the many poor communities in developing and least-developed countries that depend on forests for food, firewood, medicines and ecosystem services.

RECOMMENDED SOLUTIONS: 

It is important to highlight that there are 2 tracks climate change may take: (1) global warming or (2) global cooling.  Bernier and Schoene also presented recommendations on adapting forest and their management with reference to climate change.  They are as follows:

1. The need to incorporate adaptation to climate change in current forest management practices.  There are three possible approaches for adapting forests to climate change: no intervention, reactive adaptation and planned adaptation. No intervention and reactive adaptation are the only approaches being practiced at present. Reactive adaptation may be the most natural option but will hurt the forests and society in the long term.
2. Planned adaptation involves redefining forestry goals and practices in advance in view of climate change-related risks and uncertainties and involves deliberate, anticipatory interventions.

PLANNED ADAPTATION: 

How can planned adaptation of the forest and their management be achieved?  In broad strokes, the following is the procedure being followed in building capability for planned adaptation:

1. Planned adaptation starts with capacity and capability building for regular forest assessments.
2. Intensive forest monitoring is vital to planned adaptation to forest management.  This is a labor-intensive and lengthy undertaking.
3. Extensive documentation is done during the regular forest assessments.
4. Forest management modules are formulated per specific forest condition.
5. Out of these studies, the development of new planting stock with ideal genetic traits to counter climate change in given localities.
6. Socio-economic considerations should be highlighted too by elevating the importance of the social and behavioral sciences in forest management.

APPLICABILITY OF PLANNED ADAPTATION IN THE PHILIPPINE SITUATION: 

Planned adaptation, as recommended by Bernier and Schoene in their article, may be hard to apply in the Philippines for the following reasons:

1. Only 7% of the total forest area in the country is covered by tenurial instruments.  This is just about the area where government exercises control.  Even if 7% followed the plans and programs of government towards climate change mitigation, the figure (7%) is not enough to influence the health of Philippine forest.
2. Planned adaptation has serious costs and government might not be able to come up with the desired budget for this.  The best partners of government are the tenurial instrument holders which the government just disabled by implementing a logging moratorium over 2 years ago.  Given our government’s reputation for graft and corruption, International Funding Agencies seem to be apprehensive in financing reforestation and greening projects in the Philippines.
3. The upland/forest dwellers have no alternative means of livelihood.  They have survived from forest resources for generations and may not be willing to give up their customs and traditions.
4. The Philippines’ location in the typhoon belt and major earthquake fault makes it hard to determine natural calamities especially because of the absence of recorded historical data.

ONLY PLAUSIBLE OPTION LEFT: 

As of now, No Intervention is no longer an option as communities of people depend on the forest as their source of livelihood.  Only Reactive Adaptation could be done in the Philippines… but, then, only by the tenurial instrument holders.  Assuming that a “plant 2 trees, cut 1 tree” policy is followed, this, unfortunately, will not be enough.  The tenurial instrument holders have stopped operations leaving the “illegal” logging sector of the wood industry to wantonly cut trees without regard for any degree of reforestation whatsoever.

Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) and Selective Logging (SL) are the 2 systems being practiced by the legal/responsible loggers in the Philippines.  With these systems, economic benefit is achieved while watershed and biodiversity are protected and conserved.  The SL system restricts cutting to old and defective trees that are more than 60 centimeters in diameter.  On the other hand, SFM follows the following procedure:

• Entire concession area is divided into 30 annual cutting blocks equivalent to the first 30-year cutting cycle.
• Cut 15 to 20 mature trees of at least 60 centimeters in diameter per hectare in every schedules-cutting block leaving thousands of multi-storied young trees as future crops.
• Timber Stand Improvement, Enhancement Planting and protection following harvesting to hasten and improve growth of young trees for the next 30-year cutting cycle.

 Just my little thoughts…