FAO Forestry country profiles - harvesting practicies

History of Logging

Concerns have been raised for many years over the rate of forest destruction in the country. The rich natural systems has been significantly affected by agricultural activity over the past two centuries and, in 1985, most of the remaining forest in Madagascar was on steep slope and rugged terrain. Thus the main factor in forest conservation to date has been accessibility, or rather inaccessibility (Nagle 1990).