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Comment by lm2s | Hacker News Reader

I'll probably be downvoted but I think it's in bad taste to use this kind of (bad) news as another way to market your product. I'll surely won't be buying your product nor recommending it. /rant

What you've said about making economics drive reforestation is true, but that's like saying that to end hunger you just have to give people food.

So you suggest planting trees that take 40 years to grow when the people doing the deflorestation are doing it because of profits that they'd never get via that method. (Economics)

It's the same with the plague that is eucalyptus, you know what drove its plantation and override of all other natural trees and plants in many places of the world? Economics! So you see that just economics might not be a very good way to solve the problem at hand.

So what do you propose to make the economics work? Highly tax meat? Or other products that are indirectly causing deflorestation?

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I simply have experience in the subject because I've spent the last three years researching ways to make woodworking more sustainable. And driving up demand will in turn drive up supply, and as I explained above increased supply does indeed increase forests, as they have to be sustainably managed to come into the U.S. due to import restrictions.

Where did you end up sourcing your mahogany?

I believe Fiji currently has the world's largest mature mahogany plantation.

> driving up demand will in turn drive up supply [and] increase forests

I'm not sure this follows. Increasing the demand will merely incentivize deforestation at an increasing rate. If you start putting controls on it, the black market will just work around it just like with exotic parts from animals like horns. Let's assume you yourself are a woodcutter who believes in sustainability. The problem is that everyone else will just be thinking about short-term profits, especially when demand is so high. (see: the tragedy of the commons) If trees could be grown fast in farms like other animals or artificially like diamonds, you might have a point, but trees take so long to grow and if the demand is high, it will only encourage fast growing and killing of trees. You mention that optimizing for quality requires longer growth, and that assumes that quality wood is in demand which would also fetch higher prices, but that's debatable around the type of tree and its use. (you yourself say you have a market that require an "artisan" type of wood, but the majority of the world will be happy with whatever wood it can get, especially considering we use mixes in stuff like paper) Due to the limiting factor (time), demand will outdrive supply.

> So you suggest planting trees that take 40 years to grow when the people doing the deflorestation are doing it because of profits that they'd never get via that method. (Economics)

You can sell shares of the farm now, and pay out dividends as the wood comes to age. I invested in a brand new teak plantation in costa rica in the early 90s, and am making a continual stream of money from that since about 6 years ago.

That’s rather unfair. We should be able to distinguish between someone cynically exploiting a bad situation to enrich themselves, vs someone who is earnestly trying to offer a product that will be useful to its customers but that also has positive externalities.

We can debate the merits of a given approach, but we can be civil and charitable about it, and be appreciative when someone seems sincere about trying to do the right thing.

Seems a perfectly reasonable thing to do. The point is that he's more invested in wood because he uses wood for the product he makes. A link to the product shows he's not just making it all up.

I think it' bad taste to down vote a potentially world helping service.

And what do you do to make money that is helping us?

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