A New Look at the Plight of Tropical Rain-forests

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Abstract
While developed countries of the world are expressing growing concern about the plight of tropical rain-forests, it is necessary to understand the issues involved. They are not merely populaton growth, the world food problems, and the ever-growing demand for natural resources, but also environmental ethics and the attitudes of resource managers and other decision-makers. These last issues might be even more important in the long run than purely demographic and socio-economic problems. The Author of this essay attempts to build up a case for the need of a global environmental ethic which would incorporate existing values of respect for living creatures, sacred groves, and sacred animals—such as still survives among the cultures of the less-developed parts of the tropical world. It might well be that the life-styles of strongly vegetarian societies, and the intensive tropical lowland agriculture as practiced in and around irrigated rice-fields in Southeast Asia, could be used as a model for wiser use of renewable natural resources in the lessdeveloped tropical areas.

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