The world has observed an unprecedented rise in production, consumption and trade of fish during last three decades. Developing countries as a whole supply nearly 75% of the fish, and represent 50% of the value of global fish trade. At a time when receipts from traditional agricultural exports...

China has developed a large, flourishing and rapidly modernising wood and wood fibre industry. China consumes an estimated 365 million m3 (roundwood equivalent) of wood and wood fibre annually and relies heavily upon imports. These imports increased nearly 10-fold between 1996 and 2004 to 106...

There is a new and increasing emphasis on poverty alleviation and livelihoods improvement in forestry, representing both a challenge and an opportunity. This paper briefly reviews the evolution of the ‘livelihoods’ issue, analyses the concept of ‘poverty alleviation’ and discusses means...

The Mekong Basin is rich in water and other resources, and the six countries that share it include some of the world’s poorest on a per capita income basis. They also include some of the world’s fastest growing economies. Two of the countries also have fast growing rural populations. The...

There are good biofuels and bad biofuels. The good ones offer the prospect of transport fuels that have much lower environmental impact than fossil fuels and could before long be less expensive as well. Bad or irresponsibly produced biofuels may at best bring little environmental advantage; at...

Africa is short of food, due particularly to increasing population and under-investment in agriculture and agricultural research. For several reasons farm yields are about one-quarter of the global average. New broad cooperative approaches to the problem have had very encouraging results; Malawi...

The world’s population is estimated to peak at around nine billion in 2050, with almost half of the increase from 2009 (three billion) occurring in Asia. This will require a doubling of food production on a declining land area and natural resource base and in the context of increasing climate...