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 ForestPreserving Forests: Page 6 Several remarkable successes have proved a positive contrast to the otherwise gloomy trends of forest destruction. In South America, large expanses of undisturbed tropical forest remain, but they are fast disappearing. The Amazon Basin and its forests once covered 2.3 million square miles, comprising three‑fourths of the world's tropical forests, but forest clearing has destroyed some 20 percent of the original forests and damaged far more. Amazonian forests contain 14,000 endemic species of plants (Harcourt and Sayer 1996).
Parque Nacional Madidi, Bolivia's newest national park, covers 4.7 million acres, protecting a variety of threatened habitats and species. Avian diversity for this park is estimated at 1,088 species of birds, or 11 percent of the world's birds, the highest in any protected area in the world; among these are many threatened species and others with small ranges (Remsen and Parker 1995). This park, watered by numerous rivers, borders eastern Peru and includes a variety of threatened environments. Humid lowland forests, grasslands and montane cloud forests are among these. Resident birds include the threatened Yellow-rumped Antwren (Terenura sharpei) and various species of tinamous and curassows (Remsen and Parker 1995). The latter birds are among the first species to disappear from areas as a result of hunting and habitat destruction. A proposed hydroelectric dam, which would drown large sections of rich lowland forests., is a major threat to the park. It may have been stopped as a result of publicity by National Geographic magazine, which featured a cover story in 1999 on the importance of saving this park. Public opinion and the potential tourist trade may compensate this country for lost revenues from the dam. An even larger park of 8.6 million acres along the border with Paraguay, the Kaa-Iya del Gran Chaco National Park, protects the most sizeable block of endangered dry tropical forest in the world (Seve 1996). These two parks will preserve more than 20,000 square miles, and native tribespeople will play a role in administering them (Seve 1996).
Another positive development is the trend in a growing number of countries to share the profits from national park fees with local people and involve them in the decision-making processes of managing the park and the local wildlife. Madagascar has been successful at this, combining income from park fees with international grants to build schools, libraries and clinics for the local people. Patricia Wright, a primatologist, helped establish Ranomafana National Park to protect endangered lemurs as well as to protect the watershed from floods. In the recent past, deforestation carried out by local villagers had caused landslides that inundated their homes and caused water sources to dry up. They have become convinced of the importance of preserving the forests for their own survival. This new approach of educating local people on the benefits that would accrue to them as a result of conservation, as well as payment from park fees and profits from ecotourism, is the future of forest preservation.
Another trend that will prove important is the involvement of biologists studying wildlife with local people, learning from their observations and sharing the knowledge they uncover. Biologists in Madagascar who rediscovered an owl thought extinct, brought local students to see it and raised money for needed school supplies from birdwatchers who came from around the world to see the bird. This creates a positive impression on the local people and instills natural history curiosity and a realization of the uniqueness of their own wildlife. In the future, this may be expanded by showing them films about the natural world that surrounds them and opening up new worlds with books and publications about the subject. Very few people are aware of the endemic wildlife and plants in the environments in which they live, whether in the United States or the Cameroon. When people learn of the flora and fauna in their neighborhood that exists nowhere else, or is of biological importance, they are far more likely to protect it. Even in the United States, where Natural Heritage Programs chronicle the endemic and declining species of every state, the information has not always been made available to the public in the form of state publications or television or newspaper publicity that could have a major effect on whether forests and other habitats are protected.
A recent campaign to alert the public to the ecological advantages of choosing shade-grown, organic coffee has helped preserve rainforests in many parts of the world. A trend toward planting coffee plants in open fields rather than in the traditional way, as an understory to tall trees, has been devastating to tropical forests, home to both tropical birds and other animals, and to migratory birds from North America who spend the winter in Latin America and the Caribbean. Smithsonian biologists began this campaign in 1990 when they saw bird species decline with the planting of sun-grown coffee plants, and patented the logo "Bird Friendly" coffee. Such coffee is now commonly sold in health food and specialty stores and may become more popular as the public is educated about the problem. With the enormous popularity of coffee, this could make a major difference to birds and other wildlife.
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