Sustainable forest management policy and the analysis of convergence effects on timber production

Since the mid-1990s, three Malaysian regions, namely Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak, have implemented sustainable forest management (SFM) certification practices, one of the objectives of which is sustaining timber production per hectare. This paper attempts to examine the level of sustainability attained by these three regions by testing for convergence effects of timber production per hectare with respect to the implementation of SFM practices. Nonlinear unit root was applied to test for nonlinear convergence in the three Malaysian regions in comparison to the national average for the period of 1970 to 2007. The results of linear and nonlinear trends showed that the regions have attained long-run convergence with the national average timber production per hectare. As it stands now, this finding has shown that Malaysia practices timber production with managed sustainability.