Rehabilitation and Restoration Of Degraded Forests (PDF) - IUCN

REHABILITATION AND RESTORATION OF DEGRADED FORESTS
There has been some debate over whether restoration is ever possible
(see Box 4). In practice the question is probably not that important. In
most field situations the large extent of degraded land and limited
resources often mean that a modest increase in the biodiversity of
indigenous species through some form of rehabilitation is the most
that can be achieved. Indeed, in many cases social circumstances may
make this the preferred option, because of major trade-offs between
restoration and human well-being. Attempts at ecological restoration
might only be feasible in specialized situations.
3.2 Human well-being aspects
The ecological model described above can be complemented by a
similar model that describes the relationship between the quality of
ecosystem restoration and the improvement that this brings to the
well-being of humans living in or near the new forest area.
The quality of restoration refers to the extent to which ecosystem
integrity has been regained. It includes ecological authenticity (e.g.
ecological naturalness, viability, health) as well as the functional
effectiveness of the restoration process (e.g. the extent to which watershed
protection is established, key ecological processes are regained or
the populations of biota are able to reproduce, etc.). Ecosystem
integrity is promoted more by restoration than by rehabilitation.
The term “human well-being” is necessarily broad, and covers not only
benefits such as the market value of forest products (e.g. timber or
non-timber forest products) and other ecological services such as
watershed protection but also a broader range of benefits that flow
from them. The elements of human well-being are described by Fisher,
Dechaineux and Keonuchan (1996):
• economic benefits in the form of access to material goods (assets,
capital, labour availability, credit and availability of cash);
• quality of life factors such as health, education, culture and access
to services;
• equity, meaning how fairly well-being is distributed to different
individuals and groups (equity does not imply equality); and
• risk and power relations, which are likely to affect the rate at which
new activities can be adopted.
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