THE COSTA PLAN AS A BETTER OPTION OF MANAGEMENT FOR TROPICAL FOREST SPECIES OF JALISCO

Abstract

Administrative policies and silvicultural treatments of the Costa Plan (PC) method are presented, as they were applied in the coast of Jalisco since 1983. The idea was to know with this retrospective if PC is successful by itself. The work is based on information from forest management programs authorized by PC. The data were compared with respect to theory and scientific evidence and were compared with field visits (201 and 2012), as well as interviews with technicians and producers. The PC replaces the usual specifications of minimum diameter, intensity and cutting cycle by a single criterion that integrates attributes of maturity of the tree with its potential timber yield and the likely effect of their removal. The PC has maintained the flow of removal that supplies many products to a complex set of chains. Silvicultural treatments have helped renovate all important commercial species except Tabebuia rosea. The productive land use is total, but inventories of timber have decreased because of an attack of stem rot in Enterolobium cyclocarpum, the species of greatest volume. The performance of PC could be considered product of its design, rather than of the circumstances prevailing in the area. When comparing the PC with the Quintana Roo plan (PQR), the best documented Mexican tropical forestry method, both have avoided changes in the forest border, and if in PQR there have not yet been observed attributable successful silvicultural responses to the method, in PC they are evident.