Macaulay Land Use Research Institute, Socio-economic Research Group, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen AB15 8QH, Scotland, UK.
J Environ Manage. 2010 Jun;91(6):1294-304. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2010.02.005. Epub 2010 Mar 4.
Continuous deterioration of the natural resource base has become a serious threat to both the ecological systems and economic production in Ethiopia. Many of these problems have been attributed directly or indirectly to the rapid dwindling of the country's forest cover which is associated with unsustainable forest use and management. Closing community woodlands from human and livestock intervention to promote natural regeneration of forests has been one of the environmental restoration strategies pursued in the degraded highland areas of northern Ethiopia. However, local pressure to use reforested community lands for economic benefit has become a major threat to forest sustainability. Using locally identified sets of criteria and indicators for sustainable community forest management, this paper applies a multi-criteria decision analysis tool to evaluate forest management problems in the northern province of Tigray, Ethiopia. Three MCA methods - ranking, pair-wise comparison, and scoring - were used in evaluating the sets of criteria and indicators and alternative forest management scenarios. Results from the study indicate a number of noteworthy points: 1) MCA techniques both for identifying local level sustainability criteria and indicators and evaluating management schemes in a participatory decision environment appear to be effective tools to address local resource management problems; 2) Evaluated against the selected sets of criteria and indicators, the current forest management regime in the study area is not on a sustainable path; 3) Acquainting local people with adequate environmental knowledge and raising local awareness about the long-term consequences of environmental degradation ranked first among the set of sustainability criteria; and 4) In order to harmonize both environmental and economic objectives, the present 'ecological-biased' forest management regime needs to be substituted by an appropriate holistic scheme that takes into account stakeholders' multiple preferences and priority rankings.
自然资源基础的持续恶化已成为埃塞俄比亚生态系统和经济生产的严重威胁。这些问题中的许多都直接或间接地归因于该国森林覆盖面积的迅速减少，这与森林的不可持续利用和管理有关。为了促进森林的自然再生，关闭社区林地，防止人类和牲畜的干预，这是埃塞俄比亚北部退化高地地区所采取的环境恢复策略之一。然而，当地为了经济利益而使用重新造林的社区土地的压力，已成为森林可持续性的主要威胁。本文采用可持续社区森林管理的本地确定标准和指标集，利用多准则决策分析工具来评估埃塞俄比亚提格雷省北部的森林管理问题。使用了三种 MCA 方法——排序、两两比较和评分，对标准和指标集以及替代森林管理方案进行了评估。研究结果表明了一些值得注意的要点：1） MCA 技术既可以用于确定地方一级的可持续性标准和指标，也可以用于在参与式决策环境中评估管理方案，似乎是解决当地资源管理问题的有效工具；2）根据选定的标准和指标进行评估，研究区域当前的森林管理制度并未走上可持续发展的道路；3）让当地人民了解充足的环境知识，并提高他们对环境退化长期后果的认识，这在可持续性标准中排名第一；4）为了协调环境和经济目标，目前以“生态为导向”的森林管理体制需要被一个适当的整体方案所取代，该方案需要考虑利益相关者的多种偏好和优先排序。
