The Tree

by Colin Tudge

But at least now there are rules, which weren’t there a few years ago, and they are catching on—for reasons of sound business as well as a more general sense of enlightenment. More and more importers now insist that timber from all sources is certified by the Forestry Stewardship Council, launched in 1989, to guarantee that properly identified species have been harvested in a sustainable manner. Still, there are plenty of drawbacks, not least that the smallest providers cannot always afford to comply with the protocols: and the problem may sometimes lie with the paperwork, rather than the practice. Nonetheless, FSC guidelines are now applied to more than 40.8 million acres in more than thirty countries. The industry is at least trying to clean up its act, and give credit where it’s due. With luck, the race can be won. Perhaps what’s needed now above all are better-informed consumers: people worldwide who recognize that Brazil’s angelim, say, is a very special timber and are prepared to pay handsomely for it—provided it is certified as the right species, properly harvested. If, at the same time, producer countries ensure that the cash flows back to the communities on whose lands the trees were growing, then we truly have the basis for a benign industry that benefits everybody. The same is true, of course, in food production. If consumers pay well for properly raised chickens (chickens raised in woods are ideal) and for fair-trade organic coffee, and if the farmers get the money, then the world can truly improve. If the producers are paid too little, and production is cut-rate and careless to keep costs down and maximize profit margins, and/or the money is siphoned off by middlemen, then the world will go to pot and all of us will go with it.

  In temperate and extreme northern forests the ecology is, in principle, much simpler. Latvia is a fine example. It is neatly poised between temperate and boreal; forestry is the biggest industry. I went walking with Latvian foresters late in 2004. All the vast woods are dominated by just a few species: silver birch, Norway spruce, Scotch pine, and a couple of species of alder. Plus red and roe deer, moose, wolves, lynx, and a host of beavers, which really do dam the rivers in a most spectacular fashion. Amazing creatures. Sometimes the foresters just harvest individual trees. Sometimes they clear-cut entire areas, usually not too much at a time, and then replant. They replant only native species, barring the odd larch from Russia. Indeed, although the country is small, the foresters have notionally divided it into four regions and do not transfer trees from one region to another, since they may have different adaptations in different places.

  The Latvian forests are replenished from vast nurseries; I visited one whose properly proud owner claimed it was “only small” although she produced 180,000 birches per year, about a quarter of a million spruces, and half a million pines (plus a pleasing array of ornamentals—cypress, juniper, mountain ash, and so on). However, she raises her trees from elite parent stock—trees grown in the wild but nonetheless more robust than usual. Thus the forest is not exactly replaced in pristine form. There is some genetic improvement along the way (meaning, in effect, that the wild trees are turned into landraces). On the other hand, it seems perverse to plant seeds from trees that are known to be feeble, even if there is some loss of genetic diversity when the feeble ones are left out, so this seems a reasonable compromise. There is huge contrast with the tropics, too, in the rate of growth. The Brazilians are hoping to produce worthwhile crops of teak in eighteen years; eucalypts commonly reach harvestable size in less than a decade. The common forest trees of northern-temperate Latvia are typically expected to take around a century. Northerners plant for future generations.

  But not all pristine forest should be exploited, either by tourists or by loggers. We need heartlands left entirely to whatever forest people are indigenous to them, and to the wild creatures (albeit with rights of entry for dedicated scholars, for it is always important to improve understanding). The wild creatures have rights of their own, and besides, without those heartlands, the slightly less wild places that we do exploit will surely lose their diversity, however dutifully we strive to keep them intact.

  Great forestry cannot be a matter simply of aesthetics, however, and cannot be left simply to common sense. Both must be abetted by excellent science.

  THE RIGHT KIND OF SCIENCE

  Modern forest science can be breathtaking. It operates both on the very largest scale and on the most minute. Satellites now fly far overhead, measuring the height of individual trees to within a few centimeters—and so are able to monitor growth over vast areas, which is especially useful in times of climate change; they are able, too, from the reflected light, to identify individual species to some extent. The canopy is being opened up by towers, cranes, ingenious systems of ropes borrowed and adapted from rock climbers, and by gas-filled balloons that hover overhead and lower each scientist into the branches like a worm on a fishing line. The excitement and the promise is the same as it was half a century ago when scuba diving first opened up the coral reefs—except, of course, that the canopies are even richer than the reefs. Permanent gauges ticking twenty-four hours a day monitor the flow of gases of all kinds, including the volatile organic materials produced by the trees and by the ground litter, providing continuous data on growth and general health, year after year. Bigger and bigger computers extract more and more from the data. All in all, the instruments and the ingenuity are providing a continuous overview that even a couple of decades ago would have been beyond imagining. Without these data, we would have very little insight at all into the effects of global warming. As it is, we can see the changes unfolding before our eyes, though it is hard to grasp the complexity.

  Science operates on the smallest scale too, as demonstrated at EMBRAPA. It’s all very well to identify specific species of trees and then remove a few—but what effect does this have on the genetic diversity of the ones that are left? After all, if trees of any one species are widely scattered, the total population in any one area is unlikely to be large, and each individual may be making a significant contribution to the overall gene pool. At EMBRAPA, Dr. Milton Kanashiro coordinates a program known as the Dendrogene Project (adapted from a comparable strategy developed in Europe). The idea is to analyze the DNA in the cambium of the trees and see whether selective logging leads to any change in the total genetic variation in the population as a whole. If the results show that diversity is being lost, then the harvesting can be adjusted. Thus can science improve on commonsense rules of thumb.

  So the developing science of forestry is wondrous. The future of biology surely lies at least as much in these broad arenas as in the minutiae that at any one time are fashionable (biotech is the present-day flavor of the month). Yet we should not get carried away by forest science, or by science in general. Science does not, as is so often supposed, provide an undeviating, flawless royal road to truth. At the deepest level, modern philosophers of science point out that all its theories are uncertain—all provisional, waiting to be upset by new insights. John Stuart Mill pointed out that however much we know, we can never be sure that we haven’t missed something vital. Always there are known unknowns—and unknown unknowns, and even unknowable unknowns. When it comes to dealing with living systems—and particularly with systems as complex as tropical forests—the unknowns and the unknowables multiply. Even to acquire the most basic data is extremely difficult and time-consuming: note from earlier discussions how hard it is even to judge how many species of trees there are in the American tropics. Yet the basic inventory of species is only the beginning. The tales related in the last chapter show how complicated the relationships among different creatures can be. After half a century of close study the subtleties of figs and their dialogue with wasps are still being unraveled. But there are millions of species out there, each directly and indirectly interacting with millions of others—and among them, for good measure, bacteria and viruses can often be crucial players, and of them we have virtually no inkling at all except when particularly obvious types attack particular species that we happen to take an interest in.

  Yet there is worse. The modern t
heory of chaos shows that even a few simple forces, when left to interact, may produce endlessly complex and diverse outcomes, and the complexities and diversity are innately unpredictable. In forests there aren’t just a few simple forces. There are interactions of countless species, each subject to its own pressures. We can sometimes guess within broad limits the outcome of any one exigency—climate change or particular strategies of logging—but in detail we certainly cannot. One casual introduction can make all the difference—like the European wasps that have been taken to New Zealand and feed (among other things) on the resin from the totara and other conifers, and seem to be wiping out entire food chains of specialist insects that used to feed on resin and, in turn, were preyed upon by birds. Such outcomes cannot be predicted.

  Science, in short, for all its wondrousness, is innately limited: the picture it can give of the universe, or of life, or of trees and forests, is always biased and incomplete, and we can never tell how incomplete it is. Yet to conserve forest, and to take from it what we need, we are obliged to manage it. Clearly, even the best forest managers can never achieve the precision of the engineer. They are, at best, like physicians, who are obliged to act if their patients are in trouble but must always do so with imperfect information. They just have to use their judgment.

  So we can adjust the world’s economic structure in ways that are sensible—building it largely around trees. There is plenty of good, traditional husbandry out there. It will never be possible to control wild forests absolutely, even if it was aesthetically desirable to do so; but ecology is coming on apace. Science in general, of the right kind, can abet all human endeavor.

  What matters in the end, though, is politics—politics in the broad sense: the creation of societies that actually work, and have fruitful relations with one another. It matters who leads those societies, and what the leaders do with their power. Above all, we must never stop asking the question that seems to have gone missing. What do we actually want? What are we trying to achieve?

  I don’t believe the world can get significantly better if we leave politics to career politicians. That is not what democracy means. I also nurse the conceit (for which there is abundant evidence) that human beings are basically good (a belief that I have been intrigued to find of late is fundamental to Hindus). It seems to follow that if only democracy can be made to work—if the will of humanity as a whole can prevail—then the world could be a far better place: that it could, after all, come through these next few difficult decades; that our grandchildren can indeed live as they will want to do, and as people should.

  It follows that the most important initiatives are those that are called “grassroots.” Indeed they always have been, when you take a cool view of history: the suffragette movement, the trade unions, organic farming. Things start to work well when people at large take matters into their own hands. All these principles are exemplified by the Green Belt Movement in Kenya. Appropriately, it was begun by a woman from rural Kenya, Wangari Maathai; and it is built around trees.

  WANGARI MAATHAI AND THE GREEN BELT MOVEMENT

  Wangari Maathai was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. She is not the first African to win it—others in recent years include Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and Kofi Annan—but she is the first African woman. She began the Green Belt Movement in 1977—partly, she said in her Nobel acceptance speech, “responding to needs identified by rural women, namely lack of firewood, clean drinking water, balanced diets, shelter and income.” The people in this world whose opinions really count are those who are closest to the action, and in Africa, as Professor Maathai pointed out, “Women are the primary caretakers” and so “they are often the first to become aware of environmental damage as resources become scarce.”

  From the outset the movement focused on planting trees, to supply the things that once were taken for granted but within the past half century, in Wangari Maathai’s lifetime, have gone missing. But the psychology is vital too, as all managers everywhere recognize, for, as she said, “tree planting is simple and guarantees successful results within a reasonable amount of time. This sustains interest and commitment.”

  Since 1977 the women (primarily) of Kenya’s Green Belt Movement have planted no fewer than thirty million trees. The trees do indeed “provide fuel, food, shelter and income to support their children’s education and household needs”: everything that was hoped of them. More that that, though, as Professor Maathai told a meeting in London early in 2005, they have made the whole environment more agreeable. Kenyan people, women in particular, must still walk many miles carrying water and provisions. Whether you walk in burning sun or in shade makes all the difference—not only to the individual’s comfort but to social life. The women in treeless places had to some extent lost the habit of standing and talking. It was just too hard. Now they do it again. The temper of the whole society is improved. In the same way, Plato and Aristotle both taught their pupils in groves of trees around Athens. Ambience is everything.

  The political implications are momentous—and for those who care about humanity, as opposed to those concerned only with personal wealth and power, they are all to the good. The women, by palpably improving the whole environment, have also vastly improved “their social and economic position and relevance in the family.” More broadly, when the Green Belt Movement first began, the Kenyan people “were conditioned to believe that solutions to their problems must come from ‘outside,’” and they were “unaware of the injustices of international economic arrangements.” But “through the Green Belt Movement, thousands of ordinary citizens were mobilized and empowered to take action and effect change. They learned to overcome fear and a sense of helplessness and moved to defend their democratic rights.” In short, the Green Belt Movement has relaid the foundations of autonomy and promoted democracy. If “development” means anything worthwhile at all, surely this is it.

  Indeed, as Wangari Maathai said, “The tree became a symbol for the democratic struggle. In Nairobi’s Uhuru Park at Freedom Corner, and in many parts of the country, trees of peace were planted to demand the release of prisoners and a peaceful transition to democracy. In time, too, the tree became a symbol for peace and conflict resolution, especially during ethnic conflicts in Kenya. The Green Belt Movement used peace trees to reconcile disputing communities. The elders of the Kikuyu carried a staff from a thigi tree that, when placed between two disputing sides, caused them to stop fighting and seek reconciliation.” This tradition is widespread in Africa. Other societies worldwide, including North America, mediate discussions through “talking sticks.” Only those with the stick in hand may talk, and when they do, everyone else must listen.

  Eventually, in 2002, Kenya elected a new government, more deliberately committed to the ideals of democracy and autonomy. Wangari Maathai serves in the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources. In 2004 she established the Wangari Maathai Foundation to continue the work on a global scale. It has an office in London, at the Gaia Foundation, as well as in Nairobi.

  Kenya’s Green Belt Movement is not alone. There have been and are comparable initiatives elsewhere in the world, not least in India. But it encapsulates everything that seems to matter most. It is a people’s movement. It deals with realities—“real” realities, those of day-to-day life, of human beings and of other living creatures. All the abstractions—the need to create agrarian economies, rooted in biological reality and a true concern for human well-being—are put into practice. The abstractions can then be put where they belong, far in the background. Reality is far more interesting. What is happening in Kenya could be reenacted, in a thousand different forms, all over the world: people themselves creating a world that is good to live in. The contrast with the grand schemes that are now imposed de haut en bas, in the name of “progress,” is absolute.

  Trees are, of course, at the heart of things. How could it be otherwise? The human lineage began in trees. We have left our first ancestors far behind, but we are creatures o
f the forest still.

  NOTES AND FURTHER READING

  First, a short list of books that I refer to constantly (I have noted titles specific to chapters below).

  Jeffery Burley, Julian Evans, and John A. Youngquist, eds. Encyclopedia of Forest Sciences. 4 vols. Oxford: Elsevier, 2004. As comprehensive as can reasonably be imagined, with many fine essays. There is promise of constant updating.

  D. V. Cowen. Flowering Trees and Shrubs in India. 6th ed. Bombay: Thacker and Co., 1984. A lovely piece of publishing.

  V. H. Heywood, ed. Flowering Plants of the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978. A classic, found on the shelves of a high proportion of the botanists I have visited. I refer to it as “Heywood.”

  Hugh Johnson. The International Book of Trees. London: Mitchell Beazley, 1978.

  Walter S. Judd, Christopher S. Campbell, Elizabeth A. Kellogg, Peter F. Stevens, and Michael J. Donoghue, eds. Plant Systematics. 2nd ed. Sunderland, Mass.: Sinauer Associates, 2002. This book has become an instant classic. This is the book I call “Judd.”

  William T. Stearne. Botanical Latin. Portland, Oreg.: Timber Press, 2004. A luxury, but a pleasure for those who like words.

  1. TREES IN MIND

  1. Biologists contrive to estimate the number of trees in the tropics by applying a few statistical tricks from the few areas of certainty. One approach is to look at the number of species discovered in a single family since records began and see whether the curve is leveling out. Within the Sapotaceae (the big tropical family that includes chicle, the chewing-gum tree), effectively no species at all were known to European science by 1700. But as naturalists and then modern scientists got involved, the numbers of known types rose logarithmically, which in effect means ever more rapidly, so that by 1990 three hundred species of Sapotaceae had been recorded in the neotropics. If in the last decade of that period the number of new discoveries had leveled off, we could conclude that nearly all the neotropical Sapotaceae must by then have been known. But there was no leveling off. In 1990 the number of newly recorded types was increasing more rapidly than ever. So there is no obvious top end on the number of Sapotaceae species that might be out there. Judd suggests that the present inventory stands at eleven hundred (in fifty-three genera). But there could be many thousands.