This paper provides an overview of selected trends and conditions of ecosystem services, in particular, food production and impacts on the environment based on the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. It then describes outcomes for future ecosystem services under alternative development pathways, with a focus on tradeoffs between food security and the environment, such as implications for fertilizer use, and the role of biofuels.

Agricultural expansion, opening of new roads and migration of people to unexploited areas are all major causes of Amazon deforestation; thus many sectors share the responsibility for reversing it.

Promoting forest restoration and sustainable forest management has more promise for mitigating climate change than narrowly focusing on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD).

The concept of Special Economic Zone and its impact on development has attracted the attention of economists as well as planners the world over as they provide foreign exchange earnings with promotion of exports, create jobs to alleviate unemployment, assist in income creation and attract foreign direct investment and technology transfer.

Desertification involves many countries featuring different ecological, economic, and social conditions. In Mediterranean Europe, high human pressure, economic development, and climatic changes combine to produce land consumption, soil erosion, salinization, and fire risk, all considered as key factors to start desertification processes.

During the first 40 years of British colonial rule in Zimbabwe, from 1890 to 1930, European farmers and miners established commercial farms and mines (in prime natural regions