Livelihoods, forests, and conservation in developing countries: An Overview

• DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2004.10.004
• Publication Date: 2005-07-28T20:00:22Z
• Authors: William D. Sunderlin; Arild Angelsen; Brian Belcher; Paul Burgers; Robert Nasi; Levania Santoso; Sven Wunder
• Keywords: forests; 2. Zero hunger; poverty; 1. No poverty; nature conservation; livelihoods; 15. Life on land; 01 natural sciences; 12. Responsible consumption; E14 - Économie et politique du développement; 11. Sustainability; deforestation; P01 - Conservation de la nature et ressources foncières; K70 - Dégâts causés aux forêts et leur protection; environment; rural development; 0105 earth and related environmental sciences

In the growing literature at the interface of rural livelihood improvement and conservation of natural forests, two overarching issues stand out: (1) How and to what extent use of forest resources do and can contribute to poverty alleviation and (2) How and to what extent poverty alleviation and forest conservation are and can be made convergent rather than divergent goals. This article summarizes and evaluates the state-of-the-art knowledge in these domains of thought and identifies priorities for future research.