Attempting sustainability: Forest management and forest industries in Dominica

摘要

Large-scale logging in Dominica has been characterized both by serious environmental degradation and lack of profitability. Small-scale timber production is both less degrading and more viable financially.;However, financial viability and limited environmental degradation do not equal long-term livelihood security or sustainable development. Dominican lumber is not competitive either in terms of price or quality in comparison to imported lumber. Reasons for this lack of competitiveness and the resulting limited potential for economic growth and sustainable development through forest exploitation are explored.;Conclusions are that factors such as an island nation's inability to achieve economies of scale, localized environmental factors resulting in high extraction costs, and a variety of internal and external economic relationships significantly reduce the ability of Dominicans to achieve income security or sustainable development through non-degrading timber extraction.;The externalization of the costs of environmentally degrading timber production in other nations renders Dominican timber uncompetitive in both the domestic and export markets. The inability to produce dried timber further reduces the competitiveness of the local product. Any benefits of minimally degrading timber extraction are not internalized by the small producers, further reducing their ability to achieve income security.;Factors favouring and inhibiting sustainable forestry are analyzed and recommendations to "operationalize" sustainability are given. The potential of a small timber producers co-operative to act as a mechanism of resource management and to increase producers' livelihood security is explored.