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Mahoganies: candidates for the Red Data Book

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 April 2009

Sabina G. Knees
Affiliation:
Royal Horticultural Society's Garden, Wisley, Woking, Surrey, UK.
Martin F. Gardner
Affiliation:
Crown Estate Commissioners, The Great Park. Windsor. Berkshire, UK.
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Abstract

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Mahogany ranks as one of the world's finest timbers and it will probably be commercially extinct by 1990. The dramatic decrease in trade of true mahogany as well as a switch to previously untapped resources since the early 1970s reflects a general pattern of over-exploitation of tropical rainforests. The lack of mahogany cultivation and a move into other, unrelated mahoganylike, primary rain forest hardwoods, such as meranti and red lauan, emphasises an inevitable and irreversible decline for many hardwood forests. The authors give a summary of historical and current trade patterns in mahogany as part of a pilot study initiated and sponsored by ffPS in 1982.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Fauna and Flora International 1983

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