CIFOR facilitated 27 communities in the Upper Malinau watershed to develop agreements about their village boundaries and map them through participatory methods. Decentralization reforms created new values of forest resources and uncertainties that increased conflict over local resources. We report on the nature of these conflicts, the stability of agreements and the factors affecting how agreements were reached.

This subchapter examines the NWFP trends in the area designated as the Bulungan Research Forest, which has been allocated by the Indonesian government to CIFOR for research purposes. The research forest covers 303 000 hectares in Bulungan district, East Kalimantan, between the Malinau and Bahau rivers, adjacent to the Kayan-Mentarang National Park. The NWFPs discussed include animals and birds, camphor, gaharu, gutta percha, illipe nuts, damar and rattan. The article also raises questions about how these trends and scenarios will unfold in the future in areas such as Bulungan.

Meningkatnya laju deforestasi secara signifikan selama kurun waktu 1970-an sampai tahun 2000-an berdampak pada semakin tingginya desakan terhadap penegakan hukum kejahatan kehutanan yang lebih efektif dan komprehensif. Umumnya penanganan tindak pidana di bidang kehutanan hanya diproses berdasarkan ketentuan dalam Undang-Undang Kehutanan. Beberapa laporan dan hasil studi menyebutkan bahwa penanganan tersebut kurang efektif dalam menghentikan tindak pidana kehutanan.

The Grab Bag' is designed to complement 'the BAG' and for use by social scientists who may find 'the BAG' overly prescriptive. The eight methods presented are either more difficult for non-social scientists to use or, in a couple of cases, can substitute for one or more method presented in 'the BAG'. 'The Scoring and Analysis Guide' provides the user with help in making an actual assessment of the social C&I, based on the results of these methods.

In 2002, mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla) was listed on Appendix II of CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species). This requires that all producing countries define and implement sustainable production systems for mahogany, the most commercially important neotropical timber, which is still harvested from natural forests. The only serious efforts to produce mahogany sustainably from managed natural forests are those of communities in Quintana Roo, Mexico, which control 800,000 of natural production forests.

The BAG focuses on the social criteria and indicators for sustainable forest management, a topic that has been the subject of considerable controversy and uncertainty. It is designed for people interested in assessing sustainable forest management, but who do not have a high degree of expertise in social sciences. This manual describes six simple methods designed for use by biophysical scientists with a college education. These methods can also be used by assessors with higher levels of expertise in social sciences, but they are presented in a 'cookbook' format.

Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) is a decision-making tool developed for complex problems. In a situation where multiple criteria are involved confusion can arise if a logical, well-structured decision-making process is not followed. Another difficulty in decision-making is that reaching a general consensus in a multidisciplinary team can be very difficult to achieve. By using MCA members do not have to agree on the relative importance of the criteria or the rankings of the alternatives.

Many people want to improve the governance of forest areas, yet what is considered good governance is not necessarily self-evident or agreed upon by everyone. This study demonstrates the diversity of views held by communities and government officials in Malinau, Indonesian Borneo about what they consider to be good governance. Each group described how they thought decisions about forests should be made, including how to represent interests, allocate land rights, distribute cash benefits from forests, share information and manage forests.

This manual provides methods for the development and evaluation of criteria and indicators (C&I) which can then be used to assess the sustainability of forest management. The manual is written primarily for researchers, people or groups interested in evaluating C&I for assessments of forests in new areas, or as a reference for readers wanting to know how CIFOR's Generic Template was produced. The methods presented are aimed at the development of sets of C&I for natural forest at the forest management unit level, especially in the tropics.