"In some countries there were incentives to cut down the forests and convert them to pine and eucalyptus growth," she said. "When that didn't work, they turned the land to pasture."
Pine and eucalyptus trees are not necessarily native to tropical regions. They are usually used to reforest regions where they don't occur naturally.
According to Terwilliger, some officials were hoping to cash in on pulp and paper needs by planting the exotic trees. However, the plan didn't bear fruit.
"The exotic species of trees need a lot more work and expense to keep them healthy," she said. "So it isn't any more cost-effective to grow them in that region than it would be to grow palm trees in Minnesota."
Another reason for wanting to restore the native species is that though tropical rain forests occupy less than 7 percent of the earth's surface, they are home to more than half of all plant and animal species.
"I have worked in many tropical rain forests where there are more tree species in 10 hectares - about 25 acres - than in all of the United States and Canada," she said. "That's a remarkable array of potential timbers, medicines and foods to lose."
The total amount of rain forest lost to deforestation may never be known, she said, because more is being cut. Also, small parcels of forest do grow back in some areas.
"Somewhere between 70 percent and 80 percent of Costa Rica's forests have been cut since the 1960s," she said. "There is agreement that the amount of deforested area in the region is probably larger than ever before in human history, and problems are occurring because of this."
One of those problems is deciding exactly which areas to reforest.
"Not only are there often more plant and animal species per small area in a tropical rain forest," Terwilliger said, "but a tropical country as tiny as Costa Rica o
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Contact: Dann Hayes
dhayes@ukans.edu
913-864-8854
University of Kansas
27-Nov-1996