Suchergebnisse

Since the 2000s, consensus-oriented decision making has become increasingly common in the management of natural resources because of the recognition that collaborative processes may enhance the legitimacy of decision making and facilitate effective implementation. Previous research has identified a number of problems with the design and practical facilitation of collaborative processes. Structured decision making (SDM) has been developed as an alternative suitable for decision making characterized by complexity, stakeholder controversy, and scientific uncertainty. Our aim was to investigate the feasibility and practical relevance of collaboration and dialogue inspired by SDM in the sphere of forest management. The methods used included analyses of meetings records and semistructured interviews with participating stakeholders and organizers of a collaborative process focused on improving the management of Swedish forests in the young forest phase. The results show that the SDM rationale of step-by-step teamwork, the involvement of experts, and guidance by an independent facilitator has a number of merits. These merits included the creation of genuine discussion with careful consideration of different interests and values, thus building trust among stakeholders and the Swedish Forest Agency. However, at the end of the process, some issues still remained unclear, including how the decision options would be made practically useful and accessible to forest owners. Furthermore, concerns were raised about the lack of novelty of the options. As a result, there was uncertainty about the extent to which the options would contribute to a more varied forest landscape given the multiple values involved. We conclude with some remarks on the potential future of engaging SDM in the forestry sector.

The new European Union Forest Strategy for 2030 aims to plant an additional 3 billion trees on non-forest land to mitigate climate change. However, the choice of tree species for afforestation to achieve the maximum climate benefit is unclear. We compared the climate benefit of six different species in terms of carbon (C) sequestration in biomass and the harvested wood substitution in products to avoid carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil-based materials over the 100-year period by afforesting about 1/4 of the available area in northern Europe. The highest climate benefit was observed for larch, both at a stand scale (1626 Mg CO2 eqv. ha(-1)) and at the landscape level for the studied scenario (579 million Mg CO2 eqv.). Larch was followed by Norway spruce, poplar, hybrid aspen and birch, showing a climate benefit about 40-50% lower than that for larch. The climate benefit of willow was about 70% lower than larch. Willow showed 6-14-fold lower C stocks at the landscape level after 100 years than other tree species. The major climate benefit over the 100-year period comes from wood substitution and avoided emissions, but C stock buildup at the landscape level also removes significant amounts of CO2 already present in the atmosphere. The choice of tree species is important to maximize climate change mitigation.

Long-standing debate over the benefits of forest conservation vs. those of forest resource use and substitution continue to occupy attention in Europe and beyond. To study this question, we simulate the short- and long-term consequences for atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations of different forest management strategies and forest product uses in Sweden. We compare the projected short- and long-term consequences of increasing forest use vs. increasing land set-asides. In all scenarios but one, forest management for wood production results in higher net GHG reduction than the alternative to set-aside forests for conservation. In all scenarios, annual carbon dioxide (CO2) sequestration rates in conservation forests decline as maturing forests eventually reach a steady state, while they rise in all other forest management strategies. Thus, there is an apparent tradeoff between wood production and nature conservation. Forest set-asides are associated with sizable long-term opportunity costs corresponding to the foregone wood production capacity. Retained in the circular bioeconomy system over the long-term, forest management for wood production eventually stabilizes at significantly higher amounts than a management system which promotes greater shares of forest protection and conservation. In all cases, the long-term mitigation gains from wood production are cumulative and significant. Likewise, the indicative level of wood supply for biobased production that can be maintained without causing systematic loss in land carbon stocks is large. Such long-term consequences, however, are not properly accounted for in the European Union's (EU's) legislative LULUCF (Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry) carbon accounting framework, which effectively encourages land set-asides at the expense of forest wood production capacity.

Planting new forests has received scientific and political attention as a measure to mitigate climate change. Large, new forests have been planted in places like China and Ethiopia and, over time, a billion hectares could become available globally for planting new forests. Sustainable management of forests, which are available to wood production, has received less attention despite these forests covering at least two billion hectares globally. Better management of existing forests would improve forest growth and help mitigate climate change by increasing the forest carbon (C) stock, by storing C in forest products, and by generating wood-based materials substituting fossil C based materials or other CO2-emission-intensive materials. Some published research assumes a trade-off between the timber harvested from existing forests and the stock of C in those forest ecosystems, asserting that both cannot increase simultaneously. We tested this assumption using the uniquely detailed forest inventory data available from Finland, Norway and Sweden, hereafter denoted northern Europe. We focused on the period 1960 - 2017, that saw little change in the total area covered by forests in northern Europe. At the start of the period, rotational forestry practices began to diffuse, eventually replacing selective felling management systems as the most common management practice. Looking at data over the period we find that despite significant increases in timber and pulp wood harvests, the growth of the forest C stock accelerated. Over the study period, the C stock of the forest ecosystems in northern Europe increased by nearly 70%, while annual timber harvests increased at the about 40% over the same period. This increase in the forest C stock was close to on par with the CO2-emissions from the region (other greenhouse gases not included). Our results suggest that the important effects of management on forest growth allows the forest C stock and timber harvests to increase simultaneously. The development in northern Europe raises ...