Development of ecological criteria for forest management as a fundament for an incentive-based conservation strategy

Background

In 2002, the Instiute of Forest and Environmental Policy and the Institute for Landscape Management were given a research assignment by the Federal Agency of Nature Conservation. The goal of the project was to investigate risks and chances of the implementation of minimum ecological standards ("best practice") in German Forest Law. Aditionally, the relationships between these standards and other instruments of nature conservation policy in forests (e.g. forest funding, ecological contracting, incentive-based strategies) should be analysed. Furthermore, basic principles of conservation and concepts of financial rewards and incentives for ecological achievments in forestry should be developed. In the end, all these reserch should lead to proposals for a nature conservation strategy in the German forest sector.

Objective

Results

Analagous to the methodology of establishing goals for environmental quality, a goal system superstructure for conservation in the forest was established, in accordance with the current status of knowledge in the field of forest ecology, and various quality goals were formulated. In practice, such quality goals can only be operationalised and rewarded on a regional level. Individual quantitative and qualitative indicators are derived for those supra-regional forest conservation goals. For these indicators, simple testing quantifications are worked out which can be measured at the levels of operations or stand-level with the help of forest inventories. These testing quantifications make the indicators of a forest conservation goal measurable and comparable.

All in all, desirable goal conditions or tolerance areas, indicators, test quantifications and measures to be taken were developed for 11 forest conservation goals. In order to establish evaluative criteria for the indicators identified, either the level of the ecological forest groups or that of the growth areas is proposed, depending on the forest conservation goal. The evaluative criteria are derived either from the standard condition of natural forest structures of a particular ecological forest group, or from the historical or functional distribution of the forest ecological system prototypes of a particular growth area. Biotopic traditions typical of a specific region may be taken into account. The evaluative criteria are modelled in the form of degrees to which the goals have been attained, according to a five-level classification or to tolerance areas for each forest conversation goal. Based on this, the distribution of result-oriented assistance can be decided upon with the help of a simple self-evaluatory system used by the forestry operators.

Meanwhile results of the research project have been published as a book with the title "Naturschutz und Forstwirtschaft - Bausteine einer Naturschutzstrategie im Wald" in the series "Naturschutz und Biologische Vielfalt" of the Federal Agency of Nature Conservation.

Duration:	December 2002 - April 2004
Funding	Federal Agency of Nature Conservation
Project researcher:	Harald Schaich
Cooporation partner:	Georg Winkel ( Instiute of Forest and Environmental Policy)