sustainable forest management

Forest management is a branch of forestry concerned with overall administrative, legal, economic, and social aspects, as well as scientific and technical aspects, such as silviculture, forest protection, and forest regulation. This includes management for timber, aesthetics, recreation, urban values, water, wildlife, inland and nearshore fisheries, wood products, plant genetic resources, and other forest resource values. Management objectives can be for conservation, utilisation, or a mixture of the two. Techniques include timber extraction, planting and replanting of different species, building and maintenance of roads and pathways through forests, and preventing fire.

Many tools like remote sensing, GIS and photogrammetry modelling have been developed to improve forest inventory and management planning. Scientific research plays a crucial role in helping forest management. For example, climate modeling, biodiversity research, carbon sequestration research, GIS applications, and long-term monitoring help assess and improve forest management, ensuring its effectiveness and success.

Role of forests

The forest is a natural system that can supply different products and services. Forests supply water, mitigate climate change, provide habitats for wildlife including many pollinators which are essential for sustainable food production, provide timber and fuelwood, serve as a source of non-wood forest products including food and medicine, and contribute to rural livelihoods.

Forests include market and non-market products. Marketable products include goods that have a market price. Timber is the main one, with prices that range from a few hundred dollars per thousand board feet (MBF) to several thousand dollars for a veneer log. Others include grazing and fodder, specialty crops such as mushrooms or berries, usage fees for recreation or hunting, and biomass for bioenergy production. Forests also provide some non-market values which have no current market price. Examples of non-market goods would be improving water quality, air quality, aesthetics, and carbon sequestration.

The working of this system is influenced by the natural environment: climate, topography, soil, etc., and also by human activity. The actions of humans in forests constitute forest management. In developed societies, this management tends to be elaborated and planned in order to achieve the objectives that are considered desirable.

Aims

Some forests have been and are managed to obtain traditional forest products such as firewood, fiber for paper, and timber, with little thinking for other products and services. Nevertheless, as a result of the progression of environmental awareness, management of forests for multiple use is becoming more common.

Forests provide a variety of ecosystem services: cleaning the air, accumulating carbon, filtering water, and reducing flooding and erosion. Forests are the most biodiverse land-based ecosystem, and provide habitat for a vast array of animals, birds, plants and other life. They can provide food and material and also opportunities for recreation and education. Research has found that forest plantations "may result in reduced diversity and abundance of pollinators compared with natural forests that have greater structural and plant species diversity."

Monitoring and planning

Foresters develop and implement forest management plans relying on mapped resources, inventories showing an area's topographical features as well as its distribution of trees (by species) and other plant covers. Plans also include landowner objectives, roads, culverts, proximity to human habitation, water features and hydrological conditions, and soil information. Forest management plans typically include recommended silvicultural treatments and a timetable for their implementation. Application of digital maps in Geographic Information systems (GIS) that extracts and integrates different information about forest terrains, soil type and tree covers, etc. using, e.g. laser scanning enhances forest management plans in modern systems.

Forest management plans include recommendations to achieve the landowner's objectives and desired future conditions for the property subject to ecological, financial, logistical (e.g. access to resources), and other constraints. On some properties, plans focus on producing quality wood products for processing or sale. Hence, tree species, quantity, and form, all central to the value of harvested products quality and quantity, tend to be important components of silvicultural plans.

Good management plans include consideration of future conditions of the stand after any recommended harvests treatments, including future treatments (particularly in intermediate stand treatments), and plans for natural or artificial regeneration after final harvests.

The objectives of landowners and leaseholders influence plans for harvest and subsequent site treatment. In Britain, plans featuring "good forestry practice" must always consider the needs of other stakeholders such as nearby communities or rural residents living within or adjacent to woodland areas. Foresters consider tree felling and environmental legislation when developing plans. Plans instruct the sustainable harvesting and replacement of trees. They indicate whether road building or other forest engineering operations are required.

Agriculture and forest leaders are also trying to understand how the climate change legislation will affect what they do. The information gathered will provide the data that will determine the role of agriculture and forestry in a new climate change regulatory system.

Forest inventory

Wildlife considerations

The abundance and diversity of birds, mammals, amphibians and other wildlife are affected by strategies and types of forest management. Forests are important because they provide these species with food, space and water. Forest management is also important as it helps in conservation and utilization of the forest resources.Forest clearing to aid specific species of wildlife has been criticized because it can fragment forests leading to deleterious effects.

Approximately 50 million hectares (or 24%) of European forest land is protected for biodiversity and landscape protection. Forests allocated for soil, water, and other ecosystem services encompass around 72 million hectares (32% of European forest area). Over 90% of the world's forests regenerate organically, and more than half are covered by forest management plans or equivalents.

Management intensity

Forest management varies in intensity from a leave alone, natural situation to a highly intensive regime with silvicultural interventions. Forest Management is generally increased in intensity to achieve either economic criteria (increased timber yields, non-timber forest products, ecosystem services) or ecological criteria (species recovery, fostering of rare species, carbon sequestration).

Most of the forests in Europe have management plans; on the other hand, management plans exist for less than 25 percent of forests in Africa and less than 20 percent in South America. The area of forest under management plans is increasing in all regions – globally, it has increased by 233 million ha since 2000, reaching 2.05 billion ha in 2020.

Monitoring

Long-term monitoring studies are conducted to track forest dynamics over extended periods. These studies involve monitoring factors such as tree growth, mortality rates, and species composition. By observing forest changes over time, scientists can assess the health of forests and their responses to environmental shifts. Long-term monitoring is invaluable for informing sustainable forest management practices.

Scientific research employs remote sensing technologies and geographic information systems (GIS) to monitor changes in forest cover, deforestation rates, and forest health over time. These tools provide valuable data for forest assessments and support evidence-based decision making in forest management and conservation. By remotely monitoring forest changes, scientists can respond more effectively to threats and challenges facing forests.

Researchers conduct biodiversity assessments to gain insights into the diversity and distribution of plant and animal species in various forest ecosystems. These studies are essential for identifying areas of high conservation value and understanding the ecological importance of different habitats. By studying biodiversity patterns, scientists can recommend targeted approaches to forest management that protect and promote the richness of forest life.

Effects of climate change on forests

Research explores the specific impacts of climate change on forest ecosystems, including extreme heat and drought events. Understanding these effects is vital for developing adaptive strategies to mitigate climate change impacts on forests. By recognizing the vulnerabilities of forests to changing climatic conditions, scientists can implement conservation methods that enhance their resilience.

Scientific research plays a crucial role in forest management by utilizing climate modeling to project future climate scenarios. These models help scientists understand potential changes in temperature, precipitation patterns, and extreme weather events, enabling them to assess the impact of these changes on forest ecosystems. By predicting climate trends, researchers can develop more effective strategies for forest management and conservation.

Methods for creating or recreating forests

The term ''forestation'' is sometimes used as an umbrella term to include afforestation and reforestation. Both of those are processes for establishing and nurturing forests on lands that either previously had forest cover or were subjected to deforestation or degradation.

Tree breeding

Tree planting

Reforestation

Forest restoration

Afforestation

Types

Plantation forestry

Silviculture

Bamboo forestry

Hardwood timber production

Hardwood timber production is the process of managing stands of deciduous trees to maximize woody output. The production process is not linear because other factors must be considered, including marketable and non-marketable goods, financial benefits, management practices, and the environmental implications, of those management practices.

The more biodiverse the hardwood-forest ecosystem, the more challenges and opportunities its managers face. Managers aim for sustainable forest management to keep their cash crop renewing itself, using silvicultural practices that include growing, selling, controlling insects and most diseases, providing manure, applying herbicide treatments, and thinning.

But management can also harm the ecosystem; for example, machinery used in a timber harvest can compact the soil, stress the root system, reduce tree growth, lengthen the time needed for a stand to mature to harvestability. Machinery can also damage the understory, disturbing wildlife habitat and prevent regeneration.

Energy forestry

Forest farming

Sustainable forest management

Sustainable forest management (SFM) is the management of forests according to the principles of sustainable development. Sustainable forest management must keep a balance between the three main pillars: ecological, economic and socio-cultural. The goal of sustainable forestry is to allow for a balance to be found between making use of trees while maintaining natural patterns of disturbance and regeneration. The forestry industry mitigates climate change by boosting carbon storage in growing trees and soils and improving the sustainable supply of renewable raw materials via sustainable forest management.

Successfully achieving sustainable forest management will provide integrated benefits to all, ranging from safeguarding local livelihoods to protecting biodiversity and ecosystems provided by forests, reducing rural poverty and mitigating some of the effects of climate change. Forest conservation is essential to stop climate change.

Sustainable forest management also helps with climate change adaptation by increasing forest ecosystems' resistance to future climatic hazards and lowering the danger of additional land degradation by repairing and stabilizing soils and boosting their water-retention capacity. It contributes to the provision of a wide range of vital ecosystem services and biodiversity conservation, such as wildlife habitats, recreational amenity values, and a variety of non-timber forest products. Conservation of biodiversity is the major management aim in around 13% of the world's forests, while preservation of soil and water resources is the primary management goal in more than 30%.

Feeding humanity and conserving and sustainably using ecosystems are complementary and closely interdependent goals. Forests supply water, mitigate climate change and provide habitats for many pollinators, which are essential for sustainable food production. It is estimated that 75 percent of the world's leading food crops, representing 35 percent of global food production, benefit from animal pollination for fruit, vegetable or seed production.

The " Forest Principles" adopted at the Earth Summit (United Nations Conference on Environment and Development) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 captured the general international understanding of sustainable forest management at that time. A number of sets of criteria and indicators have since been developed to evaluate the achievement of SFM at the global, regional, country and management unit level. These were all attempts to codify and provide for assessment of the degree to which the broader objectives of sustainable forest management are being achieved in practice. In 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Non-Legally Binding Instrument on All Types of Forests. The instrument was the first of its kind that reflected the strong international commitment to promote implementation of sustainable forest management through a new approach bringing all stakeholders together.

The Sustainable Development Goal 15 is also a global initiative aimed at promoting the implementation of sustainable forest management.

Definition

A definition of SFM was developed by the Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe (FOREST EUROPE) and has since been adopted by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). It defines sustainable forest management as:

The stewardship and use of forests and forest lands in a way, and at a rate, that maintains their biodiversity, productivity, regeneration capacity, vitality and their potential to fulfill, now and in the future, relevant ecological, economic and social functions, at local, national, and global levels, and that does not cause damage to other ecosystems.

In simpler terms, the concept can be described as the attainment of balance: balance between society's increasing demands for forest products and benefits, and the preservation of forest health and diversity. This balance is critical to the survival of forests, and to the prosperity of forest-dependent communities.

For forest managers, sustainably managing a particular forest tract means determining, in a tangible way, how to use it today to ensure similar benefits, health and productivity in the future. Forest managers must assess and integrate a wide array of sometimes conflicting factors: commercial and non-commercial values, environmental considerations, community needs, even global impact to produce sound forest plans. In most cases, forest managers develop their forest plans in consultation with citizens, businesses, organizations and other interested parties in and around the forest tract being managed. The tools and visualization have been recently evolving for better management practices.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, at the request of Member States, developed and launched th
Sustainable Forest Management Toolbox
in 2014, an online collection of tools, best practices and examples of their application to support countries implementing sustainable forest management.

Because forests and societies are in constant flux, the desired outcome of sustainable forest management is not a fixed one. What constitutes a sustainably managed forest will change over time as values held by the public change.

Criteria and indicators

Criteria and indicators are tools which can be used to conceptualise, evaluate and implement sustainable forest management. Criteria define and characterize the essential elements, as well as a set of conditions or processes, by which sustainable forest management may be assessed. Periodically measured indicators reveal the direction of change with respect to each criterion.

Criteria and indicators of sustainable forest management are widely used and many countries produce national reports that assess their progress toward sustainable forest management. There are nine international and regional criteria and indicators initiatives, which collectively involve more than 150 countries. Three of the more advanced initiatives are those of the Working Group on Criteria and Indicators for the Conservation and Sustainable Management of Temperate and Boreal Forests (also called the Montréal Process), Forest Europe, and the International Tropical Timber Organization. Countries who are members of the same initiative usually agree to produce reports at the same time and using the same indicators. Within countries, at the management unit level, efforts have also been directed at developing local level criteria and indicators of sustainable forest management. The Center for International Forestry Research, the International Model Forest Network and researchers at the University of British Columbia have developed a number of tools and techniques to help forest-dependent communities develop their own local level criteria and indicators. Criteria and Indicators also form the basis of third-party forest certification programs such as the Canadian Standards Association's Sustainable Forest Management Standards and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative.

There appears to be growing international consensus on the key elements of sustainable forest management. Seven common thematic areas of sustainable forest management have emerged based on the criteria of the nine ongoing regional and international criteria and indicators initiatives. The seven thematic areas are:
* Extent of forest resources
* Biological diversity
* Forest health and vitality
* Productive functions of forest resources
* Protective functions of forest resources
* Socio-economic functions
* Legal, policy and institutional framework.

This consensus on common thematic areas (or criteria) effectively provides a common and implicit definition of sustainable forest management. The seven thematic areas were acknowledged by the international forest community at the fourth session of the United Nations Forum on Forests and the 16th session of the Committee on Forestry. These thematic areas have since been enshrined in the Non-Legally Binding Instrument on All Types of Forests as a reference framework for sustainable forest management to help achieve the purpose of the instrument.

In 2012, the Montréal Process, Forest Europe, the International Tropical Timber Organization, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, acknowledging the seven thematic areas, endorsed a joint statement of collaboration to improve global forest-related data collection and reporting and avoiding the proliferation of monitoring requirements and associated reporting burdens.

Sustainable forestry operations must also adhere to the International Labour Organization's 18 criteria on human and social rights. Gender equality, health and well-being and community consultation are examples of such rights.

Ecosystem approach

The ecosystem approach has been prominent on the agenda of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) since 1995. The CBD definition of the Ecosystem Approach and a set of principles for its application were developed at an expert meeting in Malawi in 1995, known as the Malawi Principles. The definition, 12 principles and 5 points of "operational guidance" were adopted by the fifth Conference of Parties (COP5) in 2000. The CBD definition is as follows:

The ecosystem approach is a strategy for the integrated management of land, water and living resources that promotes conservation and sustainable use in an equitable way. Application of the ecosystem approach will help to reach a balance of the three objectives of the Convention. An ecosystem approach is based on the application of appropriate scientific methodologies focused on levels of biological organization, which encompasses the essential structures, processes, functions and interactions among organisms and their environment. It recognizes that humans, with their cultural diversity, are an integral component of many ecosystems.

Sustainable forest management was recognized by parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in 2004 (Decision VII/11 of COP7) to be a concrete means of applying the Ecosystem Approach to forest ecosystems. The two concepts, sustainable forest management and the ecosystem approach, aim at promoting conservation and management practices which are environmentally, socially and economically sustainable, and which generate and maintain benefits for both present and future generations. In Europe, the MCPFE and the Council for the Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy (PEBLDS) jointly recognized sustainable forest management to be consistent with the Ecosystem Approach in 2006.

Methods

Ecoforestry

Continuous cover forestry

Mycoforestry

= Assisted natural regeneration

=

Alternative harvesting methods

Reduced impact logging (RIL) is a sustainable forestry method as it decreases the forest and canopy damages by approximately 75% compared to the conventional logging methods. Additionally, a 120-year regression model found that RIL would have a significantly higher reforestation in 30 years ("18.3 m³ ha⁻¹") in relation to conventional logging ("14.0 m³ ha⁻¹"). Furthermore, it is essential that RIL should be practiced as soon as possible to improve reforestation in the future. For instance, a study concluded that logging would have to reduce by 40% in Brazil if the current logging measures stay of "''6 trees/hectare'' with a 30-year cutting cycle" stay in place. This would be to ensure that future ground biomass to have regeneration of the original ground biomass prior to harvesting.

Preserving forest genetic resources

Appropriate use and long-term conservation of forest genetic resources (FGR) is a part of sustainable forest management. In particular when it comes to the adaptation of forests and forest management to climate change. Genetic diversity ensures that forest trees can survive, adapt and evolve under changing environmental conditions. Genetic diversity in forests also contributes to tree vitality and to the resilience towards pests and diseases. Furthermore, FGR has a crucial role in maintaining forest biological diversity at both species and ecosystem levels.

Selecting carefully the forest reproductive material with emphasis on getting a high genetic diversity rather than aiming at producing a uniform stand of trees, is essential for sustainable use of FGR. Considering the provenance is crucial as well. For example, in relation to climate change, local material may not have the genetic diversity or phenotypic plasticity to guarantee good performance under changed conditions. A different population from further away, which may have experienced selection under conditions more like those forecast for the site to be reforested, might represent a more suitable seed source.

Problems

Wildfires

Forest degradation

Deforestation

Deforestation and climate change

Checkerboarding

Checkerboarding can create problems for access and ecological management. It is one of the major causes of inholdings within the boundaries of national forests. As is the case in northwestern California, checkerboarding has resulted in issues with managing national forest land. Checkerboarding was previously applied to these areas during the period of western expansion, and they are now commercial forest land. Conflicting policies establishing the rights of the private owners of this land have caused some difficulties in the local hardwood timber production economy.

While relieving this land from its checkerboard ownership structure could benefit the timber production economy of the region, checkerboards can allow government to extend good forestry practices over intermingled private lands, by demonstration or applying pressure via economy of scale or the right of access.

Unsustainable practices

Clear-cutting

Even-aged timber management

Illegal logging

Certification systems

Forest certification is a globally recognized system for encouraging sustainable forest management and assuring that forest-based goods are derived from sustainably managed forests. This is a voluntary procedure in which an impartial third-party organization evaluates the quality of forest management and output against a set of criteria established by a governmental or commercial certification agency.

Growing environmental awareness and consumer demand for more socially responsible businesses helped third-party forest certification emerge in the 1990s as a credible tool for communicating the environmental and social performance of forest operations.

There are many potential users of certification, including: forest managers, scientists, policy makers, investors, environmental advocates, business consumers of wood and paper, and individuals.

With third-party forest certification, an independent standards setting organization (SSO) develops standards of good forest management, and independent auditors issue certificates to forest operations that comply with those standards. Forest certification verifies that forests are well-managed – as defined by a particular standard – and chain-of-custody certification tracks wood and paper products from the certified forest through processing to the point of sale.

This rise of certification led to the emergence of several different systems throughout the world. As a result, there is no single accepted forest management international standard worldwide. ISO members rejected a proposal for a forestry management system as requirements standard, with a consensus that a management system for certification would not be effective. Instead ISO members voted for a chain of custody of wood and wood-based products with ISO 38200 published in 2018. Without an international standard each system takes a somewhat different approach with scheme owners defining private standards for sustainable forest management.

In its 2009–2010 Forest Products Annual Market Review United Nations Economic Commission for Europe/Food and Agriculture Organization stated: "Over the years, many of the issues that previously divided the (certification) systems have become much less distinct. The largest certification systems now generally have the same structural programmatic requirements."

Third-party forest certification is an important tool for those seeking to ensure that the paper and wood products they purchase and use come from forests that are well-managed and legally harvested. Incorporating third-party certification into forest product procurement practices can be a centerpiece for comprehensive wood and paper policies that include factors such as the protection of sensitive forest values, thoughtful material selection and efficient use of products.

Without a single international standard, there are a proliferation of private standards, with more than fifty scheme owners offering certification worldwide, addressing the diversity of forest types and tenures. Globally, the two largest umbrella certification programs are:
* Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC)
* Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)
The Forest Stewardship Council's Policy on Conversion states that land areas converted from natural forests to round wood production after November 1994 are ineligible for Forest Stewardship Council certification.

The area of forest certified worldwide is growing slowly. PEFC is the world's largest forest certification system, with more than two-thirds of the total global certified area certified to its Sustainability Benchmarks. In 2021, PEFC issued a position statement defending their use of private standards in response to the Destruction: Certified report from Greenpeace.

In North America, there are three certification standards endorsed by PEFC – the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, the Canadian Standards Association's Sustainable Forest Management Standard, and the American Tree Farm System. SFI is the world's largest single forest certification standard by area. FSC has five standards in North America – one in the United States and four in Canada.

While certification is intended as a tool to enhance forest management practices throughout the world, to date most certified forestry operations are located in Europe and North America. A significant barrier for many forest managers in developing countries is that they lack the capacity to undergo a certification audit and maintain operations to a certification standard.

Forest governance

Although a majority of forests continue to be owned formally by government, the effectiveness of forest governance is increasingly independent of formal ownership.Agrawal, A., Chhatre, A, and Hardin, R. (2008). 'Changing Governance of the World's Forest'. ''Science'' 320: 1460–1462 Since neo-liberal ideology in the 1980s and the emanation of the climate change challenges, evidence that the state is failing to effectively manage environmental resources has emerged. Under neo-liberal regimes in the developing countries, the role of the state has diminished and the market forces have increasingly taken over the dominant socio-economic role.

The shifting of natural resource management responsibilities from central to state and local governments, where this is occurring, is usually a part of broader decentralization process.

The development of National Forest Funds is one way to address the issue of financing sustainable forest management. National forest funds (NFFs) are dedicated financing mechanisms managed by public institutions designed to support the conservation and sustainable use of forest resources. As of 2014, there are 70 NFFs operating globally.

Community forestry

Community-based forest management (CBFM) is a scheme that links governmental forest agencies and the local community in efforts to regenerate degraded forests, reforest deforested areas, and decrease carbon emissions that contribute to climate change. This partnership is done with the intent of not only repairing damage to the environment but also providing economic and social benefits to the affected area.

In principle, the benefits for the local community involvement in the management and protection of their forests would be to provide employment and to supplement income from both the wage labor and additional agriculture which would then strength the entire local economy while improving environmental conditions and mitigating climate change. Therefore, implementing a CBFM system can provide rural development while mitigating climate change and sustaining biodiversity within the region. It is important to engage the local community members, many of which are indigenous since presumably, they would have a deeper knowledge of the local ecosystems as well as the life cycles of those ecosystems over time. Their involvement also helps to ensure that their cultural practices remain intact.

Forestry law

Mitigation of deforestation and climate change

Scientific studies investigate the ability of forests to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (carbon sequestration). Through such analysis, researchers can quantify the carbon stocks present in different types of forests and assess their effectiveness as carbon sinks. Understanding the capacity of forests to sequester carbon is crucial for climate change mitigation efforts.

Forest protection

Tropical rainforest conservation

Proforestation

Proforestation is the practice of protecting existing natural forests to foster continuous growth, carbon accumulation, and structural complexity. It is recognized as an important forest based strategy for addressing the global crises in climate and biodiversity. Forest restoration can be a strategy for climate change mitigation.IPCC (2022
Summary for policy makers
i
Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA Proforestation complements other forest-based solutions like afforestation, reforestation and improved forest management.

Allowing proforestation in some secondary forests will increase their accumulated carbon and biodiversity over time. Strategies for proforestation include rewilding, such as reintroducing apex predators and keystone species as, for example, predators keep the population of herbivores in check (which reduce the biomass of vegetation). Another strategy is establishing wildlife corridors connecting isolated protected areas.

Proforestation refers specifically to enabling continuous forest growth uninterrupted by active management or timber harvesting, a term coined by scientists William Moomaw, Susan Masino, and Edward Faison.Fen Montaigne
Why Keeping Mature Forests Intact Is Key to the Climate Fight
''Yale Environment 360'', 15 October 2019.

Proforestation differs from agroforestry or the cultivation of forest plantations, the latter consisting of similarly aged trees of just one or two species. Plantations can be an efficient source of wood but often come at the expense of natural forests and cultivate little habitat for biodiversity, such as dead and fallen trees or understory plants. Further, once factoring in emissions from clearing the land and the decay of plantation waste and products at the end of their often brief lifecycles (e.g. paper products), plantations sequester 40 times less carbon than natural forests.

Proforestation is specifically recommended in “World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency, as a means to “quickly curtail habitat and biodiversity loss” and protect "high carbon stores" and areas "with the capacity to rapidly sequester carbon."

Increasing Forest and Community Resilience

1.6 billion people worldwide depend on forests for their livelihoods, including 300–350 million (half of whom are Indigenous peoples) who live near or within "dense forests" and depend almost entirely on these ecosystems for their survival. Rural households in Asia, Africa, and Latin America also depend on forests for about a quarter of their total incomes, with about half of this in the form of food, fodder, energy, building materials and medicine.
Proforestation can protect full native biodiversity and support the forests and other land types that provide resources we need. For example, research has found that old growth and complex forests are more resistant to the effects of climate change. One study found that taller trees had increased drought resistance, being able to capture and retain water better, due to their deeper root system and larger biomass. This means that even in dry conditions, these trees continued to photosynthesize at a higher rate than smaller trees.
Further, old-growth forests have been shown to be more resistant to fires compared to young forests with trees that have thinner bark and with more fuel available for increasing temperatures and fire damage. Proforestation can help to reduce fire risks to forests and the surrounding communities. They can also help absorb water and prevent flooding to surrounding communities. Considering the variety of ecosystem services complex forests provide, sustaining healthy forests means adjacent communities will be better off as well.

Workers

History

The preindustrial age has been dubbed by Werner Sombart and others as the 'wooden age', as timber and firewood were the basic resources for energy, construction and housing. The development of modern forestry is closely connected with the rise of capitalism, the economy as a science and varying notions of land use and property. Roman Latifundiae, large agricultural estates, were quite successful in maintaining the large supply of wood that was necessary for the Roman Empire.The Nature of Mediterranean Europe: An Ecological History, by Alfred Thomas Grove, Oliver Rackham, Yale University Press, 2003
review at Yale university pressNature of Mediterranean Europe: An Ecological History (review)
rian M. Fagan, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Volume 32, Number 3, Winter 2002, pp. 454-455 , Large deforestations came with the decline of the Romans. However already in the 5th century, monks in the then Byzantine Romagna on the Adriatic coast, were able to establish stone pine plantations to provide fuelwood and food. This was the beginning of the massive forest mentioned by Dante Alighieri in his 1308 poem Divine Comedy.

Similar sustainable formal forestry practices were developed by the Visigoths in the 7th century when, faced with the ever-increasing shortage of wood, they instituted a code concerned with the preservation of oak and pine forests. The use and management of many forest resources has a long history in China as well, dating back to the Han dynasty and taking place under the landowning gentry. A similar approach was used in Japan. It was also later written about by the Ming dynasty Chinese scholar Xu Guangqi (1562–1633).

In Europe, land usage rights in medieval and early modern times allowed different users to access forests and pastures. Plant litter and resin extraction were important, as pitch (resin) was essential for the caulking of ships, falking and hunting rights, firewood and building, timber gathering in wood pastures, and grazing animals in forests. The notion of "commons" (German "Allmende") refers to the underlying traditional legal term of common land. The idea of enclosed private property came about during modern times. However, most hunting rights were retained by members of the nobility which preserved the right of the nobility to access and use common land for recreation, like fox hunting.

13th to 16th century

Systematic management of forests for a sustainable yield of timber began in Portugal in the 13th century when King Afonso III planted the Pinhal do Rei (King's Pine Forest) near Leiria to prevent coastal erosion and soil degradation, and as a sustainable source for timber used in naval construction. His successor King Denis of Portugal continued the practice and the forest exists still today.

Forest management also flourished in the German states in the 14th century, e.g. in Nuremberg, and in 16th-century Japan. Typically, a forest was divided into specific sections and mapped; the harvest of timber was planned with an eye to regeneration. As timber rafting allowed for connecting large continental forests, as in south western Germany, via Main, Neckar, Danube and Rhine with the coastal cities and states, early modern forestry and remote trading were closely connected. Large firs in the black forest were called „Holländer“, as they were traded to the Dutch ship yards. Large timber rafts on the Rhine were 200 to 400m in length, 40m in width and consisted of several thousand logs. The crew consisted of 400 to 500 men, including shelter, bakeries, ovens and livestock stables. Timber rafting infrastructure allowed for large interconnected networks all over continental Europe and is still of importance in Finland.

Starting with the 16th century, enhanced world maritime trade, a boom in housing construction in Europe, and the success and further Berggeschrey (rushes) of the mining industry increased timber consumption sharply. The notion of 'Nachhaltigkeit', sustainability in forestry, is closely connected to the work of Hans Carl von Carlowitz (1645–1714), a mining administrator in Saxony. His book ''Sylvicultura oeconomica, oder haußwirthliche Nachricht und Naturmäßige Anweisung zur wilden Baum-Zucht'' (1713) was the first comprehensive treatise about sustainable yield forestry. In the UK, and, to an extent, in continental Europe, the enclosure movement and the Clearances favored strictly enclosed private property.Radkau, Joachim. Nature and Power. A Global History of the Environment. Cambridge University Press. 2008. The Agrarian reformers, early economic writers and scientists tried to get rid of the traditional commons.Nature and Power, A Global History of the Environment, by Joachim Radkau, 2008, p. 72 At the time, an alleged tragedy of the commons together with fears of a Holznot, an imminent wood shortage played a watershed role in the controversies about cooperative land use patterns.The end of the commons as a watershed' ''The Age of Ecology'', Joachim Radkau, John Wiley & Sons, 03.04.2014, p. 15 ff

The practice of establishing tree plantations in the British Isles was promoted by John Evelyn, though it had already acquired some popularity. Louis XIV's minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert's oak Forest of Tronçais, planted for the future use of the French Navy, matured as expected in the mid-19th century: "Colbert had thought of everything except the steamship," Fernand Braudel observed. Colbert's vision of forestry management was encoded in the French forestry Ordinance of 1669, which proved to be an influential management system throughout Europe. In parallel, schools of forestry were established beginning in the late 18th century in Hesse, Russia, Austria-Hungary, Sweden, France and elsewhere in Europe.

Mechanization in 19th century

Forestry mechanization was always in close connection to metal working and the development of mechanical tools to cut and transport timber to its destination. Rafting belongs to the earliest means of transport. Steel saws came up in the 15th century. The 19th century widely increased the availability of steel for whipsaws and introduced forest railways and railways in general for transport and as forestry customer. Further human induced changes, however, came since World War II, respectively in line with the "1950s syndrome". The first portable chainsaw was invented in 1918 in Canada, but large impact of mechanization in forestry started after World War II. Forestry harvesters are among the most recent developments. Although drones, planes, laser scanning, satellites and robots also play a part in forestry.

Forest conservation and early globalization

Starting from the 1750s modern scientific forestry was developed in France and the German speaking countries in the context of natural history scholarship and state administration inspired by physiocracy and cameralism. Its main traits were centralized management by professional foresters, the adherence to sustainable yield concepts with a bias towards fuelwood and timber production, artificial afforestation, and a critical view of pastoral and agricultural uses of forests.

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, forest preservation programs were established in British India, the United States, and Europe. Many foresters were either from continental Europe (like Sir Dietrich Brandis), or educated there (like Gifford Pinchot). Sir Dietrich Brandis is considered the father of tropical forestry, European concepts and practices had to be adapted in tropical and semi-arid climate zones. The development of plantation forestry was one of the (controversial) answers to the specific challenges in the tropical colonies. The enactment and evolution of forest laws and binding regulations occurred in most Western nations in the 20th century in response to growing conservation concerns and the increasing technological capacity of logging

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