Less Destructive Logging In Mexico

The topic of the century: logging. With the threat of green house gas emissions, as discussed in the article, the country of Mexico weighs the threat of emitting these gases when deciding whether or not to cut down the trees. Mexico has also resorted to giving land to local landowning villagers in hopes that they will take pride in the land while keeping in mind the benefits that keeping these trees will bring their future generations.

In Mexico, as well as Central America, there are 123 million acres, of which the Noh-Bec forest community is home to mahogany trees that have been very sustainably harvested in the past. The question now lies of whether or not to increase harvesting these trees in order to sustain the social organization of the people of the country and villages, because the export money from these trees are very large sums; however these mahogany communitues are home to rare jaguar cats. The destruction of these lands in order to benefit the people could potientially kill off these cats, by destroying thier habitats, and therefore displacing them.

So, the question once again is whether or not to destroy tree communities, in this case a group of 100 trees that are not found in any other parts of the world, in order to bring more money to people of communities. The country of Mexico must decide whether or not destroying habitats, possibly killing rare animals, and releasing green house gas emissions into the air override the finicial success of the country. Over the past 5 years, Mexico has lost 383,000 acres of trees to deforestion, so it can be inferred which decision the country has come to.

- Ciara Viola


http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6B251920101203?pageNumber=2