Forest Resources of Africa. Part II: Regional analyses

Forest Resources of Africa. Part II: Regional analyses

Editor

Royal college of Forestry ;

Descripción

This report describes the present forestry situation of Africa and the future. Country-by-country summary-tables of the most important figures about different aspects of forestry are given in an Appendix. The total closed forest area is 190 million ha or a few million more if a wider definition is accepted. The area of open woodlands of different types is about 600 million ha. The area covered by man-made forests is at least 3 million ha and may be as much as 3.5 million ha in 1976. Of this area , one-third consists of pines and one-third of eucalypts. The planned yearly planting rate is around 200,000 ha. The total gross volume of wood is roughly calculated as about 60,000 million m3 of which about two-thirds is found in closed forest types. If the present exploitation of the wood resources continues large regions of Africa will suffer in the future from a deficit of fuelwood. In many countries the known timber species will also be exhausted. For a successful future the establishing of man-made forests is essential.