Mongabay.com is considered a leading source of information on tropical forests by some of the world's top ecologists and conservationists. TROPICAL RAINFORESTS: Saving What Remains
Mongabay.com is considered a leading source of information on tropical forests by some of the world's top ecologists and conservationists.

A Problem with GDP as a Measure of National Economic Health

GDP, Gross Domestic Product, is the one of the most widely used indicators of the national economy. GDP is the annual aggregate production of all goods and services in a country. One problem with GDP is that it does not necessarily indicate the economic well-being of a country since activities that are detrimental to the long-term economy (like deforestation, strip mining, over-fishing, murders, terrorism) increase today's GDP. Therefore environmental degradation is rarely accounted for in GDP calculations. For example, the infamous Exxon Valdez oil spill showed up as a net economic gain in the US because of the expenditures associated with the clean-up effort. These expenditures outweighed the eleven million gallons of oil spilled into Alaskan waters.





Continued: Saving rainforests [an error occurred while processing this directive]
Solutions Introduction
Sustainable Forest Products
Large-scale Forest Products
Medicinal Drugs
Logging
Logging (con't)
Oil
Conservation Priorities
Reserve Size & Valuation
Organization
Intergovernmental Institutions
Communication, Education
Indigenous people
- - - -
References (1)
References (2)
References (3)
References (4)
References (5) 		Eco-tourism
Foods & Genetic Diversity
Medicinal Drugs & Pesticides
Logging (con't)
Cattle
Increasing Productivity
Types of Reserves
Funding
Developing nations
NGOs
International Organizations
Conclusion

- - - -
Kids version of this section
- How can we save rainforests?
- Education
- Rehabilitation
- Sustainable development
- Parks
- Eco-friendly companies
- Ecotourism
- What you can do







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Copyright Rhett Butler 1994-2011

"Rainforest" is used interchangeably with "rain forest" on this site. "Jungle" is generally not used.