Global Connections:
Forests of the World
Activity 7
Exploring the World Marketplace
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Objectives
Model some of the dynamics involved
in the international trade of forest
products
Compare different countries in terms of
their exports
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Searchable Key
Words
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global trade
global wood products
global wood trade
international forest trade
international wood trade
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Background
Activity 7
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Activity 7 – Background
Forests: an important economic resource
• Provide the raw materials for goods and services that
people want or need.
• Therefore, the more value that can be extracted from a
forest in terms of goods and services, the more valuable
the forest.
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Activity 7 – Background
Forest can be used in many different ways:
Harvest for timber: to make lumber or paper or for
fuel
Leave the forest standing: for habitat, for
watershed protection, for recreation, or simply for its
beauty…
Use the land area (forest conversion): cleared for
production agriculture or livestock grazing, for
commercial or residential development.
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Activity 7 – Background
Harvest for timber
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Activity 7 – Background
Leave the forest standing
Habitat
The area that provides an animal
or plant with adequate food,
water, shelter and living space
Watershed
The land area that delivers runoff
water and sediment to a major
river or stream and its tributaries
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Activity 7 – Background
Use the land area (forest conversion)
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Activity 7 – Background
World Resource Institute
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Activity 7 – Background
Economics and forests
• Choosing what to do with a forest: assessment
of what is the most valuable at the time.
• Economics help people understand how a
limited resource— like a forest—is allocated
among its possible uses to produce valuable
goods and services.
“Economics is the study of choices,” – Peter Pearce
Economics definition: the study of the production, distribution, and consumption of
goods and services
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Activity 7 – Background
Trading Forest Products
• Forests resources are not distributed evenly
across the globe.
• The natural distribution of different forest types
has always left some countries and regions
lacking in productive forests while others have
abundant forests.
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Activity 7 – Background
Forest products traded since
thousands of years ago…
• Egyptian Pharaohs purchased cedar trees from Lebanon to build ships.
• The Bible tells of King Solomon building a temple from the cedars of
Lebanon, for which he traded wheat and oil.
Many countries throughout the world today
trade forest products for other goods that they need.
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Activity 7 – Background
Global economy
• Trade around the world.
• Exchange has led to an increasingly unequal distribution
of forest resources.
• Exporting products when that exportation brings the best
price (pressure to export forest products makes fewer
forest resources available locally)
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Activity 7 – Background - Vocabulary
Export
Import
(n) a commodity
conveyed from one
country or region to
another for purposes
of trade;
(n) a commodity that is
brought from another
country or region for
purposes of trade;
(v) to sell or transfer a
commodity to
another country or
region
(v) to buy or transfer a
commodity from
another country or
region
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Activity 7 – Background
Trading
 North America and Europe: the
biggest producers of processed
wood products.
 Scandinavian: forest products for
20% of their total exports.
 Developing countries (such as
Cameroon, Solomon Islands, and
Cambodia):
exports
of
wood
products represent up to 50% of
total international trade.
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Activity 7 – Background
Worldwide demand for forest products…
…influences on forest uses, ownership, management, and
policies from early civilizations through modern times.
Forests and the need for forest products are unevenly
distributed:
Importing countries:
interests in access to
resources from the world’s
forests.
Exporting countries:
have an interest in
maintaining their forest
resources and the
capacity to produce and
manufacture wood
products for trade.
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Activity 7 – Background - Vocabulary
Ecological services
Definition: services that humans derive from environmental functions
such as photosynthesis, oxygen production, water purification, and so
on.
• In the past few years newfound international
interest in the ecological services that forests
provide.
• countries are interested in forests' capability to
help protect the biological diversity of the land,
protect water quality, and to help stabilize
carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
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Activity 7 – Background - Vocabulary
Carbon Sequestration
Definition: the removal and long-term storage of carbon dioxide from the
atmosphere through the use of natural carbon sinks, primarily in forest
trees.
• Interest for developing nations to use their forests to
produce wood products for foreign trade
• International interest in maintaining those forests—
especially in developing nations in the tropics and
subtropics—for carbon sequestration.
• Managing forests to store more carbon could help offset
the emission of greenhouse gases such as carbon
dioxide produced mostly by developed nations.
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Doing the activity
Activity 7
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Now, time to work!
Part A – Simulation
“What options do countries have if they don't
possess something (like a forest product) that
they need or want?”
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Let’s do a simulation to learn about the
international trade of forest products:
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Get into six teams to represent
different countries…
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Action…
1.
2.
3.
Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Tell the class your group’s country name, display your
flags, and introduce your prime minister and
ambassador.
One volunteer in the class will become the International
Trader.
Teams begin by first taking an inventory of their
resources and tools
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
New scenario
(introduce one at a time, as many as you want)
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•
•
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•
•
Your country has determined that forests have value when left uncut. Every
10 trees left intact at the end of the simulation will be worth $100.
A new product is introduced that uses circles in its manufacture. Because
they are in high demand, the price of circles doubles. [Change the price on
the Spec Sheets to $1,000.]
Triangles are found to be dangerous and a worldwide ban is imposed on
them. The International Trader will no longer accept them.
A hurricane hits two of the countries and wipes out one-fourth of their
forests. [Take one-fourth of the forest resources from two countries,
possibly the ones with the most money.]
The new product introduced earlier is replaced by another model that
doesn’t use circles. The price of circles drops. [Change the price on the
Spec Sheets to $250.]
Your country begins a reforestation program. Your country may add forest
at a cost of $300 per tract (sheet) of forest. [Exchange the extra “Forest”
student pages at $300 each.]
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Discussion
a.
How did you feel about the resources you were given?
b.
What planning and strategies did you use to maximize
resources?
c.
How did you feel when you realized what resources your
country had compared to other countries? How did your
feelings change as the simulation progressed?
d.
How much of the difference in countries’ results was due to the
countries strategies and how much was due to the resources
with which a country started?
e.
How did each of the additional scenarios (from step 9) affect
your country and the dynamic among the countries? How did
they affect your actions on your forest?
f.
In what way do you think this game simulated the real world? In
what ways was it a simplification?
g.
What else do you think this simulation taught you about forests
and trading issues?
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
Part B
1. Analyzing World Trade and
Consumption
a. Are all countries of the world the same in terms
of how much they use or produce a certain
forest product?
b. What factors might influence both a country's
use of and ability to produce a certain forest
product?
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
2. Each group choose a country
a.
b.
c.
d.
Look at the data for that
country and determine what
forest products the country
uses, what it imports, and
what it exports.
Discuss what the data might
say about the environmental,
social, or economic situation
of the country.
You may use “The Forests of
the World” poster for
reference.
Look at the data for the United
States and compare it to your
country’s data.
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
3. Get into pairs or small groups to
discuss the terms used in the data:
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woodfuel,
industrial roundwood
sawnwood
wood-based panels
pulp for paper
• paper and paperboard.
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Activity 7 – Doing the activity
4. Market wrap-up and discussion:
a. Which countries import only forest products?
Which export only those products? Do any do
both? Do any do neither?
b. Why might a country that exports forest
products import them as well?
c. How might the sheer volume of the United
States’ production and consumption of wood
products affect the world forest market?
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Assessment
1. Write the story of what happened to your
country in the simulation.
2. Describe:
(a) your group country’s strengths and weaknesses
(b) the processes and strategies your team used
(c) something that happened that you did not predict
(d) what you would do differently next time
(e) your impressions of either the fairness of the
simulation or how well it reflected reality
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Enrichment
Activity 3
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Activity 7 – Enrichment 1
Variation of the simulation
activity in Part A
Suggest new elements to add.
For example, see what happens if you add
different shapes or new tools, if there are
different types of forests (different colored
papers) that make different quality products with
different prices, or if countries work together as
blocs.
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Activity 7 – Enrichment - Technology
Technology
Use a computer model to simulate a global system
and change the model to see the consequences
of changes.
For example: You might use Vensim or Powersim
and might use the "World3" demonstration
model accompanying the software.
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Activity 7 – Enrichment 2
Global market
The global economy has raised the standard of
living in many developing countries, but
sometimes at a cost.
Research the pros and cons of doing business in a
global marketplace by exploring its effects on the
standard of living, environmental quality, and
human rights in a particular country.
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Resource
U.S. Department of Commerce International
Trade Administration at http://www.ita.doc.gov
provides trade statistics on non-agricultural
products (including paper, paperboard, and pulp)
between the United States and specific trading
partners.
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