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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores how forest departments and conservation associations presented forest conservation as a public matter to garner public support for their objectives during the interwar period, a time marked by fears of a global timber shortage.

Paper long abstract:

Preparing for the upcoming New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition set to open in 1925, director of forests Leon MacIntosh Ellis envisioned the court of the New Zealand State Forest Service to offer visitors a lesson on the importance of forest conservation through pedagogical tools such as relief maps, charts, and photographs. Such display, he believed, would help to foster a public forest consciousness – a utilitarian and aesthetic appreciation of forests as well as political support for forestry. Ellis’ ambition to educate the public on conservation mirrored those of contemporary advocates of conservation across the settler societies of the British empire and the United Kingdom itself in the wake of World War I. Indeed, fearing a global timber shortage, state forest departments and voluntary conservation associations across the British empire sought to create a public forest consciousness to secure public support for conservation and forestry policies. This paper explores how state forest departments and voluntary conservation associations presented forest conservation as a public matter through propaganda schemes and campaigns with the aim to garner public support for their policies, adding new insight into the relationship between forestry and notions of public opinion, and democracy. On a broader scale it offers a historical perspective to contemporary discussions on democracy, public opinion, and climate change.

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This paper examines the activities of the colonial concessionary companies in the Cross River forests. Rather than conserve these forest reserves, their activities led to deforestation and damage to the biodiversity. We argue that the threats these forests face today.

Paper long abstract:

Before 1897, the British colonial administration did not regulate the exploitation of the forests in southern Nigeria. The methods used in rubber tapping were destructive, and in response, the Acting Governor of Nigeria, Sir George Denton, proposed the creation of a forestry department similar to the one in India. In 1897, Mr. Cyril Punch was appointed as the Inspector of Forests in Southern Nigeria, and a bill was drafted to establish a forestry department and regulate the forests. In October 1899, the first forestry reserve was created, with the Ibadan chiefs ceding approximately 100 square miles of territory to the colonial government to create the Mamu Forest Reserve. In subsequent years, ordinances were passed--most significantly in 1901, 1902, and 1905--to regulate the exploitation of these reserves, with provisions to protect the interests of the concessionary companies.

This paper examines the activities of the colonial concessionary companies in the Cross River forests. In 1903, the African Mahogany Company received a timber concession, the Niger Company received a timber concession in 1912, and the John Holt Company received a timber concession in 1924. Rather than conserve these forest reserves, their activities led to deforestation and damage to the biodiversity. We argue that the threats these forests face today, such as legal and illegal logging, result from the colonial-era policies prioritizing the economic exploitation of the forests' resources.

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This paper will discuss the sustained exploitation of the forests of Nepal Terai during and after WWI to meet Indian railway companies' demands for sleepers. I will demonstrate how the imperial interests of the British Raj and Nepali government under the Ranas intersected in the jungles of Terai.

Paper long abstract:

The supply of railway sleepers to British Indian Railway Companies dwindled during the WWI. There was a heavy demand for broad-gauge sleepers overseas because of the war which resulted in a severe shortage of sleepers for railways in India. Consequently, the Railway Board approached the Nepal durbar expressing interest in the extraction of sleepers from the “excellent sal forests” in the Sarda valley. Prime Minister Chandra Shamsher was more than willing to help the Raj and Nepal was already helping the imperial war effort by sending young Nepali men to fight for the empire. Generously, Chandra made an offer, free of royalty, of up to two hundred thousand sleepers from the Sarda Valley. Chandra presented this offer as Nepal’s contribution toward the prosecution of the great war with hope and prayers for the final success of the British forces. The extraction of sleepers from Nepali forests, at a royalty, continued throughout the 1920s under the supervision of an Indian Forestry Conservator. Here was an instance of the confluence of political and economic interests of the Nepali Rana rulers and the British Indian government in the extraction of forests of Nepal Terai. In this paper, I will discuss the integration of Nepali to the larger political economy of British Raj in South Asia and the ecological consequences of it. My focus on the sal forests of Nepal Terai and their sustained extraction will also highlight ecological imperialist projects of the Nepali state that saw the Terai as its internal colony.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper argues that the process of nation-building in the Araucanía region, Chile, between 1913 and 1931, made the effort to accommodate the different uses that Euro-Chilean settlers and indigenous people had of the forest, in the forest reserves and national parks.

Paper long abstract:

Traditionally, contemporary forest history in the south of Chile has been portrayed as a part of a tale of progress and ‘Chilenization’. The state strove to control the forests and its people without major considerations of the ethnic diversity extant in the territory. However, a new analysis to the sources from the Araucanía region suggest that the situation was more complex. Indeed, this paper argues that the Chilean state made efforts to accommodate Euro-Chilean settlers and indigenous people in national parks and forest reserves, even if the general aim was to build a monocultural and ‘modern’ Chilean state. In fact, I contend that the state approached the forests and the people who relied on it from a collaborative and interconnectedness point of view, that is, according to its natural dynamics and in line with the need of the people who lived in the forests. Moreover, the Chilean authorities would have had strong and accurate arguments to curtail local uses of the forests, since deforestation was rapidly advancing, and farmers were not always interested in conservation. Thus, the results shed light over nation-building in a frontier region, showing that the state could work in a co-ordinated way, attentive to local characteristics and an as a broker between different parties. Besides, the Araucanía’s case suggests that the state machinery could achieve a relatively successful reading and management of the landscape. In other words, ‘seeing like the state’ did not necessarily involve a simplification of nature and of people as some have suggested.