Pursuing the guided development agenda, the financially poorer countries are on a heavy international debt and now feeling the urgency of repaying these huge debts due to escalating interest rates. Such a situation compels these debt ridden poorer countries to
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Global Perspectives on Sustainable Forest Management
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exploit their rich natural resources including their forests partly to earn foreign exchange for servicing their debts. For instance, construction of roads for logging operations in some South-east Asian countries was funded by Japanese aid which allowed the Japanese timber companies to exploit the forests of these countries. Understandably, these timber companies profitably exploited the forests while the South-east Asian countries were left owing Japan money for construction of their roads