Foreword
Twenty years ago, in 1992, mountains were formally included in the global
environment and development agenda, with the publication of Chap. 13—‘Managing Fragile Ecosystems: Sustainable Mountain Development’—in ‘Agenda 21’, the
plan for action signed by the heads of state or government of most of the world’s
nations at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, or
‘Earth Summit’ held in Rio de Janeiro (Debarbieux and Price 2008). Chapter 13
includes two ‘programme areas’:
• Generating and strengthening knowledge about the ecology and sustainable
development of mountain ecosystems
• Promoting integrated watershed development and alternative livelihood
opportunities
Since 1992, under the aegis of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the
United Nations (FAO) as ‘Task Manager’ for Chapter 13, considerable progress has
been made towards the goals of Chapter 13 (Price 1999; Kohler et al. 2012;
Messerli 2012). In 1994, FAO convened the Inter-Agency Group on Mountains,
which recommended at its first meeting that national governments should become
directly involved in the implementation of Chapter 13. One outcome was a series of
regional intergovernmental consultations. The first of these, in December 1994,
brought together representatives of governments from the Asia and Pacific regions
including, from Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, the Philippines,
Thailand, and Vietnam (Banskota and Karki 1995). This recognition of the importance of mountains in the region can be linked to the fact that 35 % of the area of
Southeast Asia and Oceania as a whole is mountainous, with particularly high
percentages in Laos (72 %), Myanmar (49 %), Vietnam (40 %), and the Philippines
(37 %). However, while the total mountain population of the region in 2000 was
over 52 million, of whom 20 % were urban, only one of these countries has a
particularly high proportion of its population living in mountain areas: Laos (42 %);
in others, the proportion is less than 10 % (Huddleston et al. 2003). Nevertheless, in
this region, as for many others around the world, the importance of mountains
can be evaluated not only in terms of their area and population but also the
v
Twenty years ago, in 1992, mountains were formally included in the global
environment and development agenda, with the publication of Chap. 13—‘Managing Fragile Ecosystems: Sustainable Mountain Development’—in ‘Agenda 21’, the
plan for action signed by the heads of state or government of most of the world’s
nations at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, or
‘Earth Summit’ held in Rio de Janeiro (Debarbieux and Price 2008). Chapter 13
includes two ‘programme areas’:
• Generating and strengthening knowledge about the ecology and sustainable
development of mountain ecosystems
• Promoting integrated watershed development and alternative livelihood
opportunities
Since 1992, under the aegis of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the
United Nations (FAO) as ‘Task Manager’ for Chapter 13, considerable progress has
been made towards the goals of Chapter 13 (Price 1999; Kohler et al. 2012;
Messerli 2012). In 1994, FAO convened the Inter-Agency Group on Mountains,
which recommended at its first meeting that national governments should become
directly involved in the implementation of Chapter 13. One outcome was a series of
regional intergovernmental consultations. The first of these, in December 1994,
brought together representatives of governments from the Asia and Pacific regions
including, from Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, the Philippines,
Thailand, and Vietnam (Banskota and Karki 1995). This recognition of the importance of mountains in the region can be linked to the fact that 35 % of the area of
Southeast Asia and Oceania as a whole is mountainous, with particularly high
percentages in Laos (72 %), Myanmar (49 %), Vietnam (40 %), and the Philippines
(37 %). However, while the total mountain population of the region in 2000 was
over 52 million, of whom 20 % were urban, only one of these countries has a
particularly high proportion of its population living in mountain areas: Laos (42 %);
in others, the proportion is less than 10 % (Huddleston et al. 2003). Nevertheless, in
this region, as for many others around the world, the importance of mountains
can be evaluated not only in terms of their area and population but also the
v