Understanding how rural communities use and depend upon local natural resources is a critical factor in developing policies to sustain the long-term viability of human and natural systems. Such "community-resource" linkages are particularly important in Alaska, where rural communities -many of them comprised of indigenous Alaskan Natives -are highly dependent upon local resources found on public lands. Alaskan communities utilize forests in many ways. To better understand these coupled "social-ecological" systems, we combined socio-economic data from the 2000 U.S. Census with timber permit data from the USDA Forest Service to describe communities and their use of forest resources. Our results suggest that private access to public resources is an important feature of Alaskan communities, and that continued access is likely to be a key factor in sustaining human systems on the landscape. As a result, public land managers should give special consideration to local resource use when making policy decisions.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.