The Challenge of Sustainable Forests: Forest Resource Policy in Malaysia, 1970 to 1995

The Challenge of Sustainable Forests is an innovative piece of work that provides a range of insights into forest resource use in Malaysia and the power relations behind the working of forest policy at the local level. It explores the rich debate on “development” and “environment” to cast new light on the social and ecological dimension of forest degradation.

Taking politics seriously, the book draws on the micropolitics of scientific knowledge production, in particular sustained yield technology, to examine the institutionalization of scientific forestry in forest resource management. With insights derived from fieldwork in Pahang and Sarawak, the book argues that sustainable forest management as a movement and a scientific discipline is in danger of speaking a techno-bureaucratic language similar to sustained yield, unless fundamental questions about livelihood protection and access rights to environmental and forest resources are sufficiently addressed. This process is not helped by the greater importance accorded biological and economic imperatives in conservation discourse and practice. By way of exploring this issue, The Challenge of Sustainable Forests takes a detour to the Philippines where issues of livelihood, access rights and social justice have affected management practices more seriously than in Malaysia.For sale in Asia, Australia, and New Zealand by NUS Press (Singapore)

• Fadzilah Majid Cooke, Author