Abstract:
This work briefly presents the main features of the world tropical timber economy. It is intended as an aid to those who require a good and readily accessible overview of the economic context of tropical timber, covering production, consumption and trade in the principal products, and is based on the most reliabme and most recent data available. They are presented here in the form of figures, maps and trend curves, so that the major elements of the world situation and its developments to be understood at a glance. The work is based on the annually updated statistics of the ITTO (International Tropical Timber Organization), and on the results of the « Forest Sector Questionnaire » introduced jointly by the UN-ECE, the FAO, Eurostat and the ITTO. The final section contains figures presenting more global economic data, setting this survey of the tropical timber economy in a wider perspective.