Public forest resource management in a developing country: A study of deforestation in the Philippine

The current tenure system of publicly held forested land in the Philippines provides leaseholders with little incentive to conserve forest resources or replant trees after harvest. As a result, deforestation on public lands has continued at a rate of 23% since 1955. A dynamic model of deforestation and agricultural expansion in the Philippines is developed to elucidate the economic factors driving current land use trends and determine the efficacy of prevailing public forest management regulations by quantifying the tradeoffs between the status quo resource use and the social optimum. Model results indicate large potential gains to improved management of public forest land and areas for intervention in addressing the problem of depletion and degradation of national forest resources.