forests and society – responding to global drivers of … · 3 forests and society – responding...

FORESTS AND SOCIETY – RESPONDING TO GLOBAL DRIVERS OF CHANGE

Editors:

Gerardo Mery

Pia Katila

Glenn Galloway

René I. Alfaro

Markku Kanninen

Max Lobovikov

Jari Varjo

The contents of this book do not necessarily present the views of the organizations supporting this work.

The electronic version of this book is available at http://www.iufro.org/wfse.

Publisher:

International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO)

International Union of Forest Research OrganizationsUnion Internationale des Instituts de Recherches ForestièresInternationaler Verband Forstlicher ForschungsanstaltenUnión Internacional de Organizaciones de Investigación Forestal

IUFRO World Series Vol. 25

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Recommended catalogue entry: Gerardo Mery, Pia Katila, Glenn Galloway, René I. Alfaro, Markku Kanninen, Max Lobovikov and Jari Varjo. (eds.). 2010.Forests and Society – Responding to Global Drivers of Change.IUFRO World Series Volume 25. Vienna. 509 p.

ISBN 978-3-901347-93-1

ISSN 1016-3263

Published by:International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO)

Available from:IUFRO WFSE/MetlaP. O. Box 18FI-01301 Vantaa, Finland

Tel: +358 10 211 2153Fax: +358 10 211 2202

E-mail: [email protected] site: www.iufro.org/wfse

Language editor: Maggie M. PaquetLay out: Seppo Oja

Cover photographs:Markku Kanninen, Erkki Oksanen and Dasos Capital Oy

Printed in Finland by Tammerprint Oy, Tampere, 2010

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Preface

This book is the product of World Forests, Society and Environment (WFSE), a Special Project of the International Union of Forest Research Organisa-tion (IUFRO). WFSE is a global, open, non-profit network of scientists and experts steered by ten in-ternational research organisations and coordinated by the Finnish Forest Research Institute (METLA). The network focuses on the forest, society, and envi-ronment interface. On the basis of existing scientific knowledge, it looks for innovative solutions to sup-port and advance the formulation and implementa-tion of forest-related policies that promote sustain-able development and well-being.

This book is the second volume published by WFSE in the IUFRO World Series. The first one, For-ests in the Global Balance: Changing Paradigms, was launched five years ago (August 2005) in the XXII IUFRO World Congress in Brisbane, Australia.

The present book, Forests and Society – Re-sponding to Global Drivers of Change, will be launched in the XXIII IUFRO World Congress in Seoul, Republic of Korea, August 2010.

In addition, the project has published three re-gional policy briefs in the last four years:

◆ Making European Forests Work for People and Nature (2007)

◆ Making Latin American Forests Work for People and Nature (2008)

◆ Making Sub-Saharan African Forests Work for People and Nature (2009)

A new policy brief volume will be published in the second half of 2010: Making Asian Forests Work for People and Nature.

In 2007, the Steering Committee of WFSE iden-tified globally relevant forestry-related topics to be addressed by the project. The essential idea for this book originated from an acknowledgement of the changing social and natural circumstances, and the related drivers of change affecting forests, forestry, human society, and the environment, globally and lo-cally. We are convinced that forests and forest-related

matters can no longer be addressed in isolation from the surrounding society and natural environment; in-stead, these need to be seen as an integral part of interrelated social and natural systems.

The Steering Committee of WFSE, also at the 2007 Annual Meeting, nominated the editors and identified recognised scientists who were invited to become Convening Lead Authors (CLAs) of the chapters that addressed the selected themes of the book. They invited Lead and Contributing Authors (LAs and CAs, respectively) in order to form collabo-rative research teams for conducting critical analyses in each of the themes. The work was based on the cooperation of the author teams for each chapter, as well as between these teams across the whole book. CLAs and LAs were also responsible for composing the manuscript for their chapter and for its timely submission to the editors.

Two editorial workshops were organised for facilitating the discussions of editors and CLAs to collectively debate on the contents of the chapters and on the main focus of the publication. The first workshop was arranged in September 2008 in Hel-sinki, Finland; the second one was held in Ham-burg, Germany, in 2009. In addition, editors had two meetings for polishing the publication: the first one arranged in Buenos Aires in October 2009, and the second one in Rome in January 2010. All chapters were evaluated firstly by the editors – on two oc-casions – and finally in a peer reviewing process conducted by anonymous external reviewers.

As editors of this book, we would like to express our satisfaction on the successful completion of this exciting experience, which we feel provides a set of interesting research findings on the topics studied. We sincerely hope that this publication will contrib-ute to discussions and further research related to the drivers of change, and the threats and challenges that forests, forestry, and forest-dependent people are fac-ing today and in the future. We also hope that it will foster attention to taking advantage of the possible new opportunities the changes may bring about.

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Acknowledgements

This book is the product of the work of the many scientists and experts who acted as authors in dif-ferent capacities. Many of them contributed to this book on their own time or in addition to their other duties. We would like to sincerely thank all of them for their commitment and outstanding efforts that made the preparation of this book possible.

We especially want to acknowledge the important input of all the reviewers of the different chapters of this book. We sincerely thank the reviewers for their great contribution in the improvement of the quality of this publication.

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by the Finnish Forest Research Institute (METLA) and the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Af-fairs, which made possible the development, publica-tion, and distribution of this book. We also sincerely recognise the members of the IUFRO WFSE Steering Committee for providing overall guidance and sup-port. Furthermore, we would like to thank IUFRO for continuous support to our efforts.

Our special thanks go to partner institutions for their support and valuable in-kind contributions: Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche

Tania AmmourArild AngelsenRon AylingEdmund BarrowPaul BartenSimon BellOuti BerghallKevin BishopSusan BraazDavid BrownJim CarleBernard CantinAngus Carnegie

Reviewers

Agronomique pour le Développement (CIRAD), European Forest Institute (EFI), Food and Agricul-tural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), John Heinrich von Thünen Institut (vTI), Finnish Forest Research Institute (METLA), Natural Resources Canada (NRC), Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE), United Nations University (UNU), and World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF).

We are particularly grateful to Seppo Oja for designing and preparing the layout of this publica-tion, and to Maggie M. Paquet for language edit-ing. In addition, we want to thank Yijing Zhang and Jakob Mainusch for assisting in the editorial tasks. Finally, we want to express our gratitude to all the other people and organisations who have contributed to this publication in one way or another.

Editors:

Gerardo Mery, Pia Katila, Glenn Galloway, René I. Alfaro, Markku Kanninen, Max Lobovikov, and Jari Varjo

June 2010

Stuart F. ChapinChristian CossalterDeborah DavenportJohn DeromeChris DickMarine ElbakidzeMaurizio Ferrari FarhanJianbang GanRiitta HänninenWilliam JacksonChris JacobsonLinda A. JoyceVesa Kaarakka

Antonio LaraMarylin LovelessDavid MacLeanBill MeadesAugusta MolnarAlex MosselerSeppo NevalainenNkem JohnsonBalgis Osman-ElashaChristine PadochManuel Ruiz PerezMark PoffenbergerHannu Raitio

Tapio RantaRavindranath Nijavalli H.Guy RobertsonRobin SearsOlli SaastamoinenMarcus SangsterMarcus SchaubRisto SeppäläVictoria SturtevantMeine van NoordwijkDaowei Zhang

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Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

PART I INTRODUCTION

1 Forests in a Changing World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Gerardo Mery and René I. Alfaro

PART II GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES

2 Forests and Adaptation to Climate Change: Challenges and Opportunities . . . . . 21 Convening lead author: Bruno Locatelli Lead authors: Maria Brockhaus, Alexander Buck and Ian Thompson Contributing authors: Carlos Bahamondez, Trevor Murdock, Geoff Roberts and Jaime Webbe

3 Harnessing Forests for Climate Change Mitigation through REDD+ . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Convening lead author: Markku Kanninen Lead authors: Maria Brockhaus and Daniel Murdiyarso Contributing author: Gert-Jan Nabuurs

4 Air Pollution Impacts on Forests in a Changing Climate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 Convening lead author: Martin Lorenz Lead authors: Nicholas Clarke and Elena Paoletti Contributing authors: Andrzej Bytnerowicz, Nancy Grulke, Natalia Lukina, Hiroyuki Sase and Jeroen Staelens

5 Forest Cover and Global Water Governance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Convening lead author: Anders Malmer Lead authors: Jonas Ardö, David Scott, Raffaele Vignola and Jianchu Xu

6 Forest Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: Drivers of Change, Responses and Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 Convening lead author: Bastiaan Louman Lead authors: Fabrice DeClerck, Mohammed Ellatifi, Bryan Finegan and Ian Thompson

7 Forest Health in a Changing Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 Convening lead author: René I. Alfaro Lead authors: Andrea Battisti, Allan Carroll, Richard Fleming and Jarkko Hantula Contributing authors: Danielle Francis, Paul E. Hennon, Dolly Lanfranco, Arja Lilja, Michael Müller, Mar Ramos and Alex Woods

PART III GLOBAL SOCIO-ECONOMIC CHANGES

8 Changes in Global Markets for Forest Products and Timberlands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 Convening lead authors: Anne Toppinen and Yaoqi Zhang Lead authors: Wei Geng, Susanna Laaksonen-Craig and Katja Lähtinen Contributing authors: Ning Li, Can Liu, Indrajit Majumdar and Yueqin Shen

9 Implications of Technological Development to Forestry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Convening lead authors: Lauri Hetemäki and Gerardo Mery Lead authors: Markus Holopainen, Juha Hyyppä, Lu-Min Vaario and Kim Yrjälä

10 Forests and Bioenergy production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 Convening lead author: Antti Asikainen Lead authors: Perttu Anttila, Jussi Heinimö, Tattersall Smith and Inge Stupak Contributing author: Waldir Ferreira Quirino

Contents

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11 Forestry in Changing Social Landscapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201 Convening Lead Author: Heidi Vanhanen Lead Authors: Jeremy Rayner and Yurdi Yasmi Contributing authors: Thomas Enters, Miguel Fabra-Crespo, Peter Kanowski, Heimo Karppinen, Jakob Mainusch and Annukka Valkeapää

12 Forests, Human Health and Well-Being in Light of Climate Change and Urbanisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223 Convening lead author: Caroline M. Hägerhäll Lead authors: Åsa Ode, Mari Sundli Tveit and Maria Dolores Velarde Contributing authors: Carol J. Pierce Colfer and Tytti Sarjala

13 Extra-Sectoral Drivers of Forest Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235 Convening lead authors: Maxim Lobovikov, Laura German and Dirk Jaeger Lead authors: Sebastiao Kengen and Cecil Konijnendijk Contributing authors: Irina Buttoud-Kouplevatskaya, Heru Komarudin, Keith M. McClain, Jose Rente Nascimento, George Schoneveld and J. John Stadt

PART IV REGIONAL EXAMPLES OF FOREST RELATED CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES

14 Sustainability of Boreal Forests and Forestry in a Changing Environment . . . . . . 249 Convening lead author: Philip J. Burton Lead authors: Yves Bergeron, Bryan E.C. Bogdanski, Glenn Patrick Juday,Timo Kuuluvainen, Brenda J. McAfee, Aynslie Ogden and Victor K. Teplyakov Contributing authors: René I. Alfaro, Danielle A. Francis, Sylvie Gauthier and Jarkko Hantula

15 Amazon Forests at the Crossroads: Pressures, Responses, and Challenges . . . . . . 283 Convening lead author: Wil de Jong Lead authors: Jan Borner, Pablo Pacheco, Benno Pokorny and César Sabogal Contributing authors: Charlotte Benneker, Walter Cano, Carlos Cornejo, Kristen Evans, Sergio Ruiz and Mario Zenteno

16 Opportunities and Challenges for Community forestry: Lessons from Tropical America . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299 Convening lead author: Wil de Jong Lead authors: Carlos Cornejo, Pablo Pacheco, Benno Pokorny and Dietmar Stoian Contributing authors: César Sabogal and Bastiaan Louman

17 Emerging Local Economic and Social Dynamics Shaping East African Forest Landscapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315 Convening lead author: Abwoli Banana Lead authors: Mukadasi Buyinza, Emmanuel Luoga and Paul Ongugo

18 Secondary Forests in West Africa: a Challenge and Opportunity for Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335 Convening lead author: Jobst-Michael Schroeder Lead authors: David O. Oke, Jonathan C. Onyekwelu and Eshetu Yirdaw

19 Promoting Sustainable Forest Management through Community Forestry in the Philippines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355 Convening lead author: Lucrecio L. Rebugio Lead authors: Antonio P. Carandang, Josefina T. Dizon and Juan M. Pulhin Contributing authors: Leni D. Camacho, Don Koo Lee and Eleno O. Peralta

20 Genetic Resources and Conservation of Mahogany in Mesoamerica . . . . . . . . . . . 369 Convening lead author: Carlos Navarro Lead authors: David Boshier, Stephen Cavers and Andrew Lowe

21 Sustainability of Wood Supply: Risk Analysis for a Pulp Mill in Guangxi, China . . . 385 Convening lead author: Martti Varmola Lead author: Markku Kanninen Contributing authors: Ning Li and Daping Xu

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PART V MANAGEMENT OPTIONS, POLICIES AND INSTITUTIONAL ARRANGEMENTS TO ADDRESS NEW CHALLENGES

22 Managing Forested Landscapes for Socio-Ecological Resilience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401 Convening lead authors: Brenda J. McAfee and Ronnie de Camino Lead authors: Philip J. Burton, Brian Eddy, Lutz Fähser, Christian Messier, Maureen G. Reed, Tom Spies and Roberto Vides Contributing authors: Carolina Baker, Milka Barriga, José Campos, Olga Corrales, Leonardo Espinoza, Sachi Gibson, Jonas Glatthorn, Catherine Martineau-Delisle, Cornelis Prins and Nancy-Anne Rose

23 Ability of Institutions to Address New Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441 Convening lead authors: Benjamin Cashore and Glenn Galloway Lead authors: Frederick Cubbage, David Humphreys, Pia Katila, Kelly Levin, Ahmad Maryudi, Constance McDermott and Kathleen McGinley Contributing authors: Sebastião Kengen, Moacir José Sales Medrado, María Cristina Puente, August B Temu and Ederson Augusto Zanetti

PART VI THE WAY FORWARD

24 The Need for New Strategies and Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 489 Glenn Galloway, Pia Katila and Joachim Krug Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 501

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List of BoxesBox 2.1 Adaptation and vulnerability: Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Box 2.2 Using future tree suitability projections for adaptation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Trevor Murdock

Box 2.3 Vulnerability assessment of Chilean forests and landowners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Carlos Bahamondez

Box 2.4 Adaptation for forests in the NCs and NAPAs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Box 2.5 Forests for adaptation in the NAPAs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Box 3.1 Forest-related issues in the Copenhagen Accord . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Box 3.2 Role of northern forests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Gert-Jan Nabuurs

Box 3.3 FCPF and UN-REDD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Box 4.1 Ozone impact and risk assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Elena Paoletti and Nancy E. Grulke

Box 5.1 Water challenges in the Sahel – human or natural. An example of complexity . . . . . . . . 78 Jonas Ardö

Box 5.2 Controversy: Do forests act like sponges to conserve water? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Anders Malmer

Box 5.3 China: Optimising land use is first priority . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 Jianchu Xu

Box 5.4 South Africa: Empty rivers downstream of forest plantations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 David Scott

Box 5.5 Different development and needs drives forms of governance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Box 7.1 Lessons from a Dothistroma needle blight epidemic in northwestern British Columbia, Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 Alex Woods

Box 7.2 Climate change effects on the decline of yellow-cedar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 Paul Hennon

Box 7.3 Forest management, climate change, and feedbacks: the mountain pine beetle in western North America . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 Allan Carroll

Box 7.4 New forest epidemics in northern Europe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 Jarkko Hantula, Michael Müller and Arja Lilja

Box 7.5 Biological control of the invasive pine shoot moth, Rhyaciona buoliana, in changing Chilean environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 Dolly Lanfranco and Mar Ramos

Box 8.1 Non-wood forest product and trade: Lin’an, China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 Yueqin Shen and Yaoqi Zhang

Box 8.2 Market perspective of bioeconomy from forestry: the case of Ontario, Canada . . . . . . . 142 Indrajit Majumdar

Box 8.3 The growing importance of corporate responsibility in the forest-based industry . . . . . 146 Ning Li and Anne Toppinen

Box 8.4 Forestry investments in China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 Can Liu

Box 9.1 Forest biorefinery: an example of policy driven technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Lauri Hetemäki

Box 9.2 Endophytic bacteria to improve fitness of woody plants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Kim Yrjälä and Lu-Min Vaario

Box 9.3 Laser Measurement-Based Precision Forestry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172 Markus Holopainen and Juha Hyyppä

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Box 10.1 From deforestation to sustainable fuelwood production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

Box 11.1 Australians’ attitudes to forests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208 Peter Kanowski

Box 11.2 Do attitudes about forests differ between ordinary citizens and forest owners? . . . . . . 212 Heimo Karppinen and Annukka Valkeapää

Box 11.3 Comparing citizens’ perceptions of forests in the Spanish regions of Valencia and Cantabria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214 Miguel Fabra-Crespo

Box 11.4 Potential future areas of conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 Yurdi Yasmi and Thomas Enters

Box 11.5 Attitudes to forestry and conservation in Indonesia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218 Jakob Mainusch

Box 12. 1 Climate change and vector-borne diseases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225 Mari Sundli Tveit

Box 12.2 Forest and human health in tropical areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226 Caroline M. Hägerhäll and Carol Colfer

Box 12.3 Forests as a source of health-promoting and bioactive compounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227 Tytti Sarjala

Box 13.1 Forests and infrastructure: Managing cumulative effects in a boreal landscape of Alberta, Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238 J. John Stadt and Keith M. McClain

Box 13.2 Forests and urbanisation: The Sihlwald in Zurich, Switzerland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240 Cecil Konijnendijk

Box 14.1 Old growth in the Canadian boreal forest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256 Yves Bergeron and Sylvie Gauthier

Box 14.2 IUCN red-listed species in the boreal forest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258 Brenda J. McAfee

Box 14.3 Recent efforts to promote wood processing in Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261 Victor Teplyakov

Box 14.4 More insect damage to come: the spruce budworm in Canada’s boreal forest . . . . . . . . 264 René I. Alfaro

Box 14.5 Heterobasidion parviporum in Finland: expectations for climatic change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266 Jarkko Hantula

Box 14.6 A Case study of sustainable forest management in a changing climate: Champagne-Aishihik Traditional Territory, South-west Yukon, Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274 Aynslie Ogden

Box 17.1 Causes of encroachment in East African forest landscapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326

Box 17.2 FACE-UWA Carbon Sequestration Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328

Box 18.1 Geographical determination of West Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

Box 19.1 Ngan, Palansalan, Pagsabangan Forest Resource Development Cooperative’s (NPPFRDC’s) experience with cancellation of Resource Use Permit due to the absence of a legislated law that supports CBFM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364

Box 22.1 Enabling condition and power balance: Case studies from El Petén, Guatemala; Hojancha, Costa Rica; and Yuscarán, Honduras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 422 Ronnie De Camino, Carolina Baker and Leonardo Espinoza

Box 22.2 Public participation: Status and challenges in Quebec, Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426 Catherine Martineau-Delisle

Box 23.1 Policy Intersection: the Case of European Union (EU)-Indonesian Forest Law Enforcement, Governance, and Trade (FLEG-T) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474 Ahmad Maryudi

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ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations

BRIC Brazil, Russia, India, China CATIE Tropical Agricultural Research and

Education Centre CBD Convention on Biological Diversity CBFM Community-Based Forest Manage-

ment CDM Clean Development Mechanism CF Community Forest CIFOR Center for International Forestry

Research CIRAD Centre de Coopération Inter-

nationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement

COP Conference of PartiesCR Corporate Responsibility CSR Corporate Social Responsibility DBH Diameter at Breast HeightDSS Decision Support Systems EBM Ecosystem-Based ManagementEFI European Forest InstituteENGO Environmental Non-Governmental

OrganizationEU European UnionEUR EuroFAO Food and Agricultural Organization

of the United NationsFLEGT Forest Law Enforcement, Governance

and Trade FSC Forest Stewardship CouncilGCM General Circulation ModelGDP Gross Domestic Production GEF Global Environment FacilityGHG Greenhouse Gas GIS Geographic Information SystemGMO Genetically Modified OrganismICRAF World Agroforestry Centre ICT Information and Communication

TechnologiesIMF International Monetary FundINIFAP National Institute for Agricultural,

Livestock and Forestry Research of Mexico

IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

ITTO International Tropical Timber Organi-zation

IUCN International Union for Conservation of Nature

IUFRO International Union of Forest Research Organizations

MAI Mean Annual IncrementMCPFE Ministerial Conference on the Pro-

tection of Forests in Europe MDGs Millennium Development GoalsMEA Millennium Ecosystem AssessmentMETLA Finnish Forest Research InstituteNGO Non-Governmental Organization NRC Natural Resources CanadaNTFP Non-Timber Forest Product NWFP Non-Wood Forest Product PEFC Programme for the Endorsement of

Forest Certification PES Payment for Environmental ServicesR&D Research and DevelopmentREDD Reducing Emissions from Deforesta-

tion and Forest Degradation SF Sustainable ForestSFM Sustainable Forest Management SME Small and Medium Sized EnterpriseUN United Nations UNCED United Nations Conference on

Environment and Development UNDP United Nations Development

ProgrammeUNECE United Nations Economic Commis-

sion for Europe UNESCO United Nations Educational,

Scientific, and Cultural Organization UNFCCC United Nations Framework

Convention on Climate Change UNFF United Nations Forum on Forests UNU United Nations UniversityUS United StatesUSA United States of AmericaUSD United States DollarvTI John Heinrich von Thünen InstitutWFSE World Forests, Society and Environ-

mentWTO World Trade OrganizationWWF World Wildlife Fund

Abbreviations and Acronyms

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PART I

IntroductIon

Ger

ardo

Mer

y

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1.1 The Rationale of the Book

This new book produced by the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) Special Project on World Forests, Society and Environment (WFSE) is the result of a collaborative effort involv-ing researchers in multiple disciplines from through-out the world. The publication was conceived as a forum to analyse the challenges, threats, and oppor-tunities facing the forest sector due to the profound changes that our planet and contemporary society are experiencing. The unprecedented pressures produced by these changes – many of which are global in na-ture, such as climate change, the growing demands of human society on natural resources, and increas-ing deforestation – often place the very survival of numerous ecosystems at risk, threatening their resil-ience, and seriously affecting the biodiversity of the planet and the well-being of society.

This book follows our previous publication, For-ests in the Global Balance: Changing Paradigms (Mery et al. 2005), and uses a similar research ap-proach in which the analyses evolve in broad global or regional levels, and the phenomena studied are intended to describe problems and challenges in a comprehensive manner. Our aim has been to avoid an analysis of the forest sector in isolation. We wanted to consider the pressures and synergies on forests pre-sented by other socio-economic sectors, particularly those that have a clear impact on forests and forestry, such as wood-based industries, agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the complex array of pressures from a growing human population and the resultant high demands for forest products and services. We wanted to apply an interdisciplinary approach to the topics studied.

Our primary interest was to identify the main drivers of change and their direct or indirect re-percussions on forests and forestry, to propose ways to reduce the adverse effects posed by these drivers, and to identify the benefits or opportunities these drivers of change may bring. We have included a number of case studies that serve to illustrate how society and institutions are striving to respond to the aforementioned drivers of change, at different scales, and in diverse parts of the world.

A key aspect in this publication was to investigate whether the foremost paradigm that has governed forestry during the last two decades, namely sustain-able forest management (SFM), is really working in practice for people and nature. We acknowledge the strategic impetus provided by SFM in the sustained production of goods and services, and in the mainten-ance of future options related to forests, without dam-aging other ecosystems. However, the rampant rate of deforestation and forest degradation that still exists, the continuity of the serious problems affecting our planet’s biodiversity, and the persistence of poverty in areas where forest resources play an important role in socio-economic development, has led us to think that the ultimate solution to these problems must be found not only by considering forests and forestry activities, but also in looking beyond the forest sector.

Therefore, our a priori consideration was the urgent need to broaden the concept of SFM through a more integrated notion of social and natural re-source management, including the management of land, water, and other natural resources along with the forests. On that basis, we may find a proper bal-ance – at the broadest landscape level – that enables us not only to use these natural resources, but also to effectively conserve them for the benefit of future generations.

Special emphasis was placed on analysing poli-cies and institutional arrangements being pursued to address new challenges, and how global and re-gional policy goals translate into tangible progress in sustainable forest management at the local level. Drawing on experience to date, and on the perceived growing complexity of the forestry sector, policy and institutional arrangements are proposed, as well as conclusions about the profile of new professionals needed to meet crucial challenges affecting forests, society, and the environment.

Consistent with the analysis and assumptions outlined above, this book, Forests and Society – Re-sponding to Global Drivers of Change, offers readers 24 chapters grouped into six parts. This first part is introductory, explains the purpose of the book, and describes a brief introduction for each chap-ter. The second part, in six chapters, analyses the

1 Forests in a Changing World

Gerardo Mery and René I. Alfaro

INTRODUCTION

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1 FORESTS IN A CHANGING WORLD 1 FORESTS IN A CHANGING WORLD

global environmental changes affecting the world’s forests. The third part, also with six chapters, deals with issues relating to global socio-economic chan-ges affecting forests. The fourth part presents eight regional or local examples of forest-related challen-ges and opportunities in the changing world. The fifth part, in two chapters, deals with forest management options, policies, and institutional arrangements the authors believe are needed to address new challen-ges, and present the main findings, highlighting the challenges and opportunities found within the book, and propose strategies to promote a better future for people and forests. In the sixth part, the final chapter of the book, the reader will find in-depth analyses of the challenges and opportunities faced by forests and forestry in a changing world. Beginning with Part 2, Chapter 2, the individual chapters are briefly described below.

1.2 Brief Introduction to the Chapters

Chapter 2 is Forests and Adaptation to Climate Change: Challenges and Opportunities. In this chap-ter, the authors explain why and how forests and forest-dependent societies are likely to be affected by climate change and its associated environmental and socio-economic disturbances. The chapter pro-vides an overview of climate change as a driver of change in forests, the challenges and opportunities of adapting forests and forest-dependent people to

climate change, and the use of forests in adaptation practices, as well as associated policy issues.

In Chapter 3, Harnessing Forests for Climate Change Mitigation through REDD+, the authors point out that deforestation, forest degradation, and land-use changes are major sources of carbon emis-sions. The urgent need to reduce carbon emissions has led to the development of mechanisms, such as REDD+, that may provide an attractive option to enable developed countries to partially achieve their reduction targets through investment in developing countries. Such mechanisms may also provide less developed countries with a source of financing for sustainable forest management to support rural de-velopment plans and poverty reduction strategies. The implementation of these new mechanisms will demand the active participation of local communi-ties, enabling them to benefit from emerging carbon markets and opportunities generated by the renewal of governmental institutions, and the formulation and application of new policies and regulations.

Chapter 4, Air Pollution Impacts on Forests in a Changing Climate, is also concerned with climate change issues. The authors point out that awareness of air pollution effects on forests from the early 1980s led to intensive research, monitoring, and public awareness, particularly in developed countries. The first indications of a recovery of forest soil and tree conditions – which may be attributed to improved air quality – have been identified. However, the in-tegrative effects of air pollution and climatic change (particularly elevated O

3) altered nutrient cycling and

availability, temperature, water availability, and el-

Photo 1. This book was developed by 160 authors from all around the world through a collaborative and open process. The photo shows the participants to the Editorial Workshop organised on the premises of von Thünen Institut in Hamburg, Germany, in June 2009.

von

Thün

en In

stitu

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1 FORESTS IN A CHANGING WORLD

15



evated CO2, will be key issues for research, including

into interactions of these effects and the development of ecosystem models integrating multiple effects.

In Chapter 5, Forest Cover in Global Water Gov-ernance, the authors stress the importance of water as a key resource for growing human populations and for sustaining increased production of food and energy under threat from climate change. The central role of forests in water cycling and for protecting water quality is also emphasised. The development of a common understanding of the role of forest man-agement in water governance, and a readiness for diverse future scenarios in a global change perspec-tive are key objectives. Major conclusions include emphasis on preparedness for solutions where forest management is part of water governance to meet the needs of different land users. The importance of transparency and local involvement of stakeholders is also discussed.

Chapter 6, Forest Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: Drivers of Change, Responses, and Chal-lenges, describes four relevant anthropogenic driv-ers of change in biodiversity, namely conversion of forests into agricultural lands, over-exploitation of forests, air pollution leading to climate change and acid rain, and invasive species. The authors recom-mend a proactive approach to forest conservation, combining aspects of willingness to conserve with willingness to pay for further conservation; removal of administrative barriers to sustainable forest man-agement and protection; landscape management; inter-sectoral coordination between international, national, and local policies; increased communica-tion among stakeholders; and more research on the interactions between biodiversity and ecosystem services.

In Chapter 7, Forest Health in a Changing Envi-ronment, the authors emphasise that climate change will have profound effects on future forest distribu-tion and composition, as well as on the organisms living in forests. It describes how climate change models anticipate that trees will become more sus-ceptible to insects and diseases as these organisms sustain alterations in their lifecycles, increase their host ranges and virulence, and become important drivers of change in forest ecosystems. Accelerated global trade will foster the likelihood of introduction of new pathogens as well as plants and animals alien to native ecosystems. Measures for increasing forest resistance to climate-induced forest health decline and the role of pest management as a mitigating tool for climate change on forests are presented.

Chapter 8, Changes in Global Markets for Forest Products and Timberlands, presents a brief review of the major global trends in the trade of forest products, followed by an analysis of foreign direct investment in forest industries, and the growth of timberland investments. The driving forces of changes are identi-

fied and investigated. The reallocation of the forest industry’s production capacity in developing coun-tries is analysed. The authors also discuss the chang-ing face of forestry and the global markets for wood products, coupled with timberland investment as a form of joint response to changing economies, mar-kets, land values, technologies, and public policies. The greater environmental awareness of consumers is also considered.

Chapter 9, Implications of Technological De-velopment (TD) to Forestry, observes that TD often creates new opportunities and structures that make obsolete and commonly destroy the old technolo-gies. Technological development has rarely been the focus of forest research, despite its large impact on different fields of forest sciences and forestry. The impacts of technological change on the forest sector are analysed by focusing on three technologies: in-formation and communication technologies, biotech-nology applications in forestry, and laser technology applications to forest inventories and monitoring. The implications and opportunities created by these three technologies are analysed, as well as the chal-lenges that they represent.

Chapter 10, Forests and Bioenergy Production, refers to the growing global role of forests as a renew-able energy source. The authors explain how woody biomass is increasingly being used for power, heat, and in the derivation of transportation fuels. Forest-based energy production can reduce the use of fossil fuels and the emission of greenhouse gases. How-ever, the over-utilisation of forest ecosystems can jeopardise the sustainable development of forests and have negative effects on the people who are depend-ent on them. Therefore, forest energy policies have to be based on the principle of sustainable development, ensuring both socio-economic and environmental vi-ability of this use of the resource.

Chapter 11, Forestry in Changing Social Land-scapes, describes how current rapid changes tend to push social and ecological systems toward un-sustainable conditions. The challenge is to maintain the balance between these systems and, simultane-ously, secure ecological resilience while avoiding social disruption and insecurity. Global population growth, its concentration in urban centres, as well as changing consumption habits, will impact global land use, including forests. Perceptions and attitudes, and inherent cultures of societies, determine the level of public support and success of forestry, the imple-mentation of sustainable management, and effective conservation measures.

Chapter 12, Forests, Human Health and Well-being in Light of Climate Change and Urbanisation, begins with the recognition that forests provide a wide range of ecosystem goods and services ben-eficial (and in many cases, absolutely required) for human life in both urban and rural areas. In addition,

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1 FORESTS IN A CHANGING WORLD 1 FORESTS IN A CHANGING WORLD

forests are important arenas for recreation, aesthetic appreciation, and stress relief, and for some cultures, even spiritual renewal. However, many of these posi-tive effects of forests on human health and well-being may be threatened as a result of climate change. In-creased pressure on urban forests and their capacity to provide ecosystem services, reduced availability and quality of recreational areas, and higher risk of exposure to vector-borne diseases are some of the adverse effects discussed.

Chapter 13, Extra-Sectoral Drivers of Forest Change, discusses the importance of drivers that are external to the forest sector in shaping forests and forestry. These driving forces originate beyond forestry, and often affect forests and their social, eco-nomic, and ecological functions. The authors explain that these drivers of change have frequently contrib-uted to extra-sectoral influences that eclipse secto-ral developments as key drivers of forest landscape transformation. A brief overview of extra-sectoral pressures on forests, and the effects these have had on forest-dependent communities, is given.

Chapter 14, Sustainability of Boreal Forests and Forestry in a Changing Environment, explains that this extensive biome, which is undergoing changes such as thawing of permafrost and increased levels of natural and anthropogenic disturbance, may produce net releases of CO

2 and methane, while forest cover

with greater biomass can be expected to expand onto the arctic tundra. Human use in some parts of north-ern forests is becoming more centralised and indus-trialised. The ecosystems and people of the world’s boreal forests are vulnerable to impending climatic and socio-economic changes. Despite these changes, the boreal zone will continue to present opportunities to undertake landscape management over large areas dominated by natural forests to conserve biodiversity, establish and sustain economically viable enterprises and enhance development opportunities for northern communities.

Chapter 15, Amazon Forests at the Crossroads: Pressures, Responses, and Challenges, describes some of the current key social, occupational, and political dynamics in the region, and reviews the prime threats affecting Amazonian forests and rural livelihoods. Among these are cattle-ranching, soy-beans production, logging, infrastructure expansion, and the oil and gas industry. Also, a review of several recent responses to these threats is discussed, includ-ing progress in retooling institutions: for example, land tenure reform, decentralised government and deregulation, and incentives to support sustainable forest use and the newly emerging REDD initia-tives.

Chapter 16, Opportunities and Challenges for Community Forestry: Lessons from Tropical Ameri-ca, focuses on the actual contribution of forests and trees to rural livelihoods concentrating on evidence

that provides a more precise identification of the real potential of communal forestry to contribute to rural development. The authors review some of the challenges faced by community forestry develop-ment initiatives, and critically reflect on the need for actions to favour community forestry enterprise development and their integration into forest prod-ucts value chains. These measures are seen necessary to enhance the generation of profits and to better prepare community-based enterprises to deal with complex policies and regulations. Finally, the po-tentials, limitations, and challenges of community and smallholder forestry are discussed.

Emerging Local Economic and Social Dynamics Shaping East African Forest Landscapes is the sub-ject of Chapter 17. It focuses on three East African countries: Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. Climate change is a future threat in the region, accentuated by the heavy dependency of local communities on forest resources for income and fuelwood. Conversion of forest land to agriculture is another key challenge. Among the major drivers of deforestation is the fail-ure to implement policies and regulations meant to control the use of forest resources. New initiatives have been undertaken to help resolve these challeng-es, including decentralisation, increasing participa-tion of communities in the management of forests, expanding the role of the private sector, and local communities in forest plantation development.

In Chapter 18, Secondary Forests in West Africa: A Challenge and Opportunity for Management, the authors point out that secondary forests constitute about 90% of West African forests. These forests are often degraded and continue to suffer diverse pressures and disturbances. Viable options for the sustainable use of these forests must be developed. A broad dissemination and application of rehabilita-tion concepts based on ecological processes – such as succession – must be undertaken. Applicable sil-vicultural management systems, including enrich-ment planting, refining, and liberation to gradually re-convert degraded forests into valuable timber resources, must be explored and applied with local participation. Agroforestry and utilisation of non-wood forest products also offer good possibilities for management, economic improvement of impov-erished resources and food security, contributing to the stabilisation of livelihood strategies of rural populations.

Chapter 19, Promoting Sustainable Forest Management Through Community Forestry in the Philippines, explains that participation and equity are core values of “community forestry or partici-patory forestry.” The Philippines is one of the pio-neers in Asia in the adoption of community-based forest management strategies, having three decades of experience in promoting sustainable forest man-agement (SFM) through the participation of local


17



communities. The potential and current limitations of this national strategy are explored, and the rationale, history, objectives, and analyses of the factors behind its development are explained. Different approaches to community forestry, accomplishments, and out-comes are discussed; the enabling and reinforcing mechanisms are analysed, along with the issues and challenges facing the implementation of SFM. Fi-nally, a synopsis of conclusions and lessons learned is presented.

Chapter 20, Genetic Resources and Conser-vation of Mahogany in Mesoamerica, reviews the current knowledge on the genetic variation of ma-hogany (Swietenia spp.) and discusses the impor-tance of provenance variability, seed transfer and sourcing recommendations. Further, the authors explore management strategies for mahogany, and provide guidelines for conversing genetic diversity in different forest landscapes. They conclude that con-servation and sustainable management of mahogany genetic resources are not simple tasks, requiring local community involvement to prevent illegal logging. Community efforts must be compensated to ensure mutual benefit. Landscape level strategies for the effective management of mahogany trees outside of forests, for example in agroforestry practices, are ur-gently needed. An international consensus is needed for phytosanitary procedures.

Chapter 21, Sustainability of Wood Supply: Risk Analysis for a Pulp Mill in Guangxi, China, focuses on the experiences of Stora Enso Corporation in es-tablishing eucalypt plantations for supplying a large pulp mill in southern China with an annual produc-tion capacity of 1 million tonnes. The evaluation of the project concluded that it would be profitable, and environmentally and socially sustainable. Wood supply was assessed to be sufficient for the plant, a conclusion based on simple estimates of mean annual increment and areas of plantation available without fully taking into account many high-risk factors. The paper illustrates the need for many new fast-growing eucalypt plantations to ensure long-term sustainability of wood supply. National macro-eco-nomic planning; a consistent policy and management framework; and systematic and focused approaches emanating from the government and the private sec-tor are needed, including clear policies of corporate responsibility.

Chapter 22, Managing Forested Landscapes for Socio-Ecological Resilience, puts forward new ap-proaches for managing forests for wood and other ecosystem goods and services. Case studies are used to illustrate recent advances in forest management in response to local impacts brought on by global change that address current challenges and ele-ments of an emerging management paradigm based on ecological and socio-economic systems. Such a framework recognises the complexity of systems, their hierarchical structures, their interactions, and their capacity for self-organisation. Learning how to facilitate the ability of natural forest systems to self-organise, adapt and evolve, and to guide them towards a desired appropriate state is one of the challenges. The increasing importance of engagement, capacity building, and participation in landscape management is recognised as a first step toward maintaining the provision of ecosystem goods and services.

Chapter 23, Ability of Institutions to Address New Challenges, presents an analytical framework for reviewing research findings and analysing the most promising institutional settings with which to address the drivers of change, to ameliorate problems, and to encourage responsible and sustainable forest management. Attention is focused on the shift from government to governance, political authority, dis-entangling abstract policy for specific requirements, and capacity enhancing knowledge-generating and administrative institutions. It reveals that the glo-bal nature of economic, social, and environmental demands on the world’s forests, and complex com-mercial trade relationships, require an integrative analyses of domestic and local responses to assess the role of innovative regional and global institutions designed to address “good governance.” The authors conclude by calling for much greater attention to the potential of synergistic institutional intersection to respond to new and enduring challenges in ways that single institutions are incapable of doing.

Chapter 24, the concluding chapter, is titled The Need for New Strategies and Approaches. This chapter summarises the main findings of the book, highlights challenges and opportunities, and analyses and proposes strategies required to promote a more promising future for people and forests. A brief al-lusion is made to the profile of new professionals required to meet current challenges affecting forests, society, and the environment. The key messages of the book are presented in a concise fashion in the last section of this chapter.

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PART II

Global EnvironmEntal ChanGEs

Mat

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2 Forests and Adaptation to Climate Change: Challenges and Opportunities

Convening lead author: Bruno Locatelli

Lead authors: Maria Brockhaus, Alexander Buck and Ian Thompson

Contributing authors: Carlos Bahamondez, Trevor Murdock, Geoff Roberts and Jaime Webbe

Abstract: Climate change is an important driver of changes in forests. As forests and forest-dependent societies are likely to be affected by climate change and its associated disturbances, adaptation is needed for reducing the vulnerability of forests to climate change. New challenges arise from the need to understand the vulnerability of forests and forest-dependent communities to climate change and to facilitate how they adapt to the changes. Forests also play a role in how the broader society adapts to climate change because forests provide diverse ecosystem services that contribute to human well-being and reduce social vulnerability. For this reason, forests should be considered in planning the adaptation of the society beyond forests. Ecosystem-based adaptation, an emerging approach to dealing forests in a changing climate, offers opportunities for forest and forest-dependent communities and supports the conservation or sustainable management of forests. This chapter presents an overview of climate change as a driver of changes in forests, the challenges and opportunities of adapting forests and the use of forests in adaptation practices, as well as the associated policy issues.

Keywords: climate change, adaptation, vulnerability, impacts, adaptive capacity, resilience, biodiversity, ecosystem services, ecosystem-based adaptation, adaptation policy

■

GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES

2.1 Introduction

Since the publication of its first assessment report in 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has gathered incontrovertible evi-dence of human-induced climate change and the impacts it will have on ecosystems and on human societies (IPCC 2007). For tackling the resulting problems, two broad categories of responses have been defined: (1) mitigation (reducing the accu-mulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere) and, (2) adaptation (reducing the vulnerability of societies and ecosystems facing the impacts of cli-mate change). So far, the prominent international responses – the United Nations Framework Conven-tion on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol – have focussed on mitigation rather than adaptation. However, with some degree of global temperature increase now recognised as inevitable, adaptation is

gaining importance in climate policy arenas at global and national levels.

While forests have a place in mitigation science and policy, their place in the emerging science of adaptation and in new climate-related policies is still to be built up. The linkage between forests and adaptation is two-fold: first, adaptation is needed for forests and forest-dependent people; second, forests play a role in adaptation of the broader society. In the first instance, because climate change is an important driver of changes in forests, new challenges arise from the need to understand both how the forests will change and what will be the impacts of those changes on forest-dependent people. We will need to assess the vulnerability of forest-dependent communities to the changes in forests, as well as determine success-ful ways of adapting to those changes (see definitions of vulnerability and adaptation in Box 2.1).

In the second instance, because forests provide ecosystem services that contribute to human well-

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2 FORESTS AND ADAPTATION TO CLImATE CHANGE: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTuNITIES 2 FORESTS AND ADAPTATION TO CLImATE CHANGE: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTuNITIES

being and reduce social vulnerability, forests should be considered when planning adaptation policies and practices in sectors outside of the forest sector. This presents new opportunities for the forest sector.

This chapter presents an overview of climate change as a driver of changes in forests, the chal-lenges and opportunities of adapting forests and us-ing forests for adaptation, as well as the associated policy issues.

2.2 Forests are Vulnerable to Climate Change

Many forests are likely to be affected this century by an unprecedented combination of climate change, associated disturbances (e.g., flooding, drought, wildfire, insects), and other drivers of change (e.g., land use change, pollution, over-exploitation of re-sources).

According to the IPCC definition of vulnerabil-ity (see Box 2.1), the potential impacts of climate change on forests result from exposure and sensitiv-

According to the IPCC, vulnerability is “the degree to which a system is susceptible to, or unable to cope with, adverse effects of climate change, including climate variability and extremes. Vulnerability is a function of the character, magnitude, and rate of climate variation to which a system is exposed, its sensitivity, and its adaptive capacity” (McCarthy et al. 2001). According to the IPCC definition, the three components of vulnerability are exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity (see definitions in the figure, where the signs under the arrows mean that high exposure, high sensitivity, and low adap-tive capacity induce high vulnerability).

Adaptation is defined by the IPCC as “an ad-justment in natural or human systems in response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their ef-

Figure 2.1 Definitions.

fects, which moderates harm or exploits beneficial opportunities.” Various types of adaptation are distinguished, such as anticipatory or proactive adaptation (“that takes place before impacts of climate change are observed”), reactive adaptation (“that takes place after impacts of climate change have been observed”), autonomous or spontaneous adaptation (“that does not constitute a conscious response to climatic stimuli but is triggered by eco-logical changes in natural systems and by market or welfare changes in human systems”) and planned adaptation (“that is the result of a deliberate policy decision, based on an awareness that conditions have changed or are about to change and that action is required to return to, maintain, or achieve a desired state”).

Box 2.1 Adaptation and vulnerability: Definitions

Vulnerability ”The degree to which a system is susceptible to, or

unable to cope with adverse effects of climate change, including climate variability and extremes”

Potential impacts PI ”All impacts that may occur given a projected change in climate, without considering

adaptation”

Adaptive capacity AC ”The ability to adjust to climate change

(including climate variability and extremes) to moderate potential damages, to take

advantage of opportunities, or to cope with the consequences”

Exposure E ”The nature and

degree to which a system is exposed to significant climatic

variations”

Sensitivity S ”The degree to which a system is affected, either

adversely or beneficially, by climate-related stimuli. The effect may be direct (e.g. damages

caused by an increase in the frequency of coastal flooding due to sea level rise”

+

+ +

-

2 FORESTS AND ADAPTATION TO CLImATE CHANGE: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTuNITIES

23



ity. Forests are exposed to different factors of climate change and variability, as well as other drivers, such as changes in land use or pollution, that may ex-acerbate the impacts of climate change (see Figure 2.2). Sensitivity refers to the degree to which a forest will be affected by a change in climate, either posi-tively or negatively, such as through changes in tree level processes, species distribution, or disturbance regimes (see Figure 2.2).

The vulnerability of a forest also depends on its adaptive capacity (see definition in Box 2.1). Even if the adaptive capacity of forests remains uncertain (Julius et al. 2008), many scientists are concerned that this innate capacity will not be sufficient to enable forests to adapt to unprecedented rates of climatic changes (Gitay et al. 2002, Seppälä et al. 2009). Species can adapt to climate change through phenotypic plasticity (commonly termed acclimati-sation), adaptive evolution, or migration to suitable sites (Markham 1996, Bawa and Dayanandan 1998). The adaptive capacity of an ecosystem is related to the diversity of functional groups within the ecosys-tem and the diversity of species within groups, the most compelling explanation being the redundancy provided by multi-species membership in critical functional groups (Walker 1992, 1995; Peterson et al. 1998; Thompson et al. 2009). Several studies suggest that successful adaptation to climate change may require migration rates much faster than those observed in the past, such as during postglacial times (Malcolm et al. 2002, Pearson 2006).

In the following sections, we present some evi-dence of impacts and vulnerability of forests, ac-cording to biomes. Various forest classifications have been derived to describe the large diversity among global forest types. Here we use four forest biomes (boreal, temperate, subtropical, and tropical) (see FAO 2001 and Map 2.1).

We describe climate change impacts for two clus-ters of climate scenarios: growth and stable (Fischlin et al. 2009). The growth cluster includes scenarios in which emissions continue to increase over the course of the current century at rates similar to those in the second half of the last century (i.e., “business as usu-al”) due to the absence of stringent climate policy, as in, for instance, the IPCC reference scenarios A1FI, A1B, and A2. The stable cluster includes scenarios in which emissions decline during the course of the current century as a result of major socio-economic changes that allow atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO

2)

concentrations to approach a new equilibrium by the year 2100, as in, for instance, the IPCC reference scenarios A1T, B2, and B1.

We also describe how the impacts of climate change will affect biodiversity. According to the IPCC, roughly 20–30% of vascular plants and higher animals on the planet are estimated to be at an in-creasingly high risk of extinction as temperatures increase by 2–3°C above pre-industrial levels (Fis-chlin et al. 2009). Even small changes in climate could affect phenological events (such as flowering and fruiting) that may escalate into major impacts on forest biodiversity. This is because co-evolution has produced highly specialised interactions among specific plant and animal species in natural forests.

Overall, it is very likely that even modest losses in biodiversity would cause consequential changes in the ecosystem services that forests provide, such as the service of sequestering carbon. Climate feed-backs from local climate to the global carbon cycle may have major implications for the global climate and may contribute to an acceleration of climate change. Several climate change models project that the carbon-regulating services of forests could be severely degraded under climate scenarios in the growth cluster (Cramer et al. 2004).

Figure 2.2 Components of the exposure and sensitivity of forest ecosystems (after Johnston and Williamson 2007).

Exposure Sensitivity

Climate change and variability Increase in temperature Changes in precipitation Changes in seasonal patterns Hurricanes and storms Increase in CO2 levels

Sea level rise Other drivers

Land use change Landscape fragmentation Resource exploitation Pollution

Changes in tree level processes e.g. productivity

Changes in species distribution Changes in site conditions

e.g. soil condition Changes in stand structure

e.g. density, height Changes in disturbance regimes

e.g. fires, pests and diseases

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2.2.1 Tropical Forests

Impacts of climate variability and change have al-ready been observed in tropical forests, for instance, on ecosystem structure and functioning, and carbon cycling (Root et al. 2003, Fearnside 2004, Malhi and Phillips 2004). Studies of changes in tropical forest regions since the last glacial maximum show the sensitivity of species composition and ecology to climate changes (Hughen et al. 2004). Climate variability and associated events, such as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, have caused drought and in-creased the frequency of fire in humid tropical forests in Indonesia and Brazil (Barlow and Peres 2004, Murdiyarso and Lebel 2007). Some species extinc-tions linked to climate change have already been reported for tropical forests. For example, Pounds et al. (1999, 2006) reported that climate change and a fungal pathogen were important causes of recent extinctions of the golden toad (Bufo periglenes).

Climate change is expected to cause significant shifts in the distribution of tropical rainforests and disturbance patterns. The possibility that climate change could enhance drought in the Amazon is of major concern because it would cause increased wildfire, climate-induced forest dieback, and large-scale conversion of tropical rainforest to savannah, which has important implications for the global cli-mate (Cox et al. 2004, Scholze et al. 2006, Nepstad et al. 2008). In the humid tropics of north Queensland (Australia), significant shifts in the extent and distri-bution of tropical forests are likely because several forest types are highly sensitive to a 1°C warming, and most types are sensitive to changes in precipita-tion (Hilbert et al. 2001).

Tropical cloud forests are an important subset of tropical forests from a climate change perspective.

Even small-scale shifts in temperature and precipita-tion are expected to have serious consequences be-cause cloud forests are located in areas having steep gradients. The highly specific climatic conditions of cloud forests (Foster 2002) that justify monitoring these forests for possible effects of climate change (Loope and Giambelluca 1998). Atmospheric warm-ing raises the altitude of cloud cover that provides tropical cloud forest species with the prolonged mois-ture they receive by being immersed in the clouds (Pounds et al. 1999). The habitats they require will shift up the slopes of mountains, forcing species into increasingly smaller areas (Hansen et al. 2003). In East Maui, Hawaii, the steep microclimatic gradients combined with increases in interannual variability in precipitation and hurricanes are expected to cause replacement of endemic biota by non-native plants and animals (Loope and Giambelluca 1998).

Tropical dry forests are very sensitive to changes in rainfall, which can affect vegetation productiv-ity and plant survival (Hulme 2005, Miles 2006). Studies conducted in Tanzania and Costa Rica show that tropical dry forests may be particularly sensitive to life zone shifts under climate change (Mwakif-wamba and Mwakasonda 2001, Enquist 2002). A slight annual decrease in precipitation is expected to make tropical dry forests subject to greater risk from forest fires in the immediate future. Prolonging the dry seasons would enhance desiccation, mak-ing the forest system more exposed and sensitive to fires. However, increased fire occurrence can lead eventually to a decrease of fires due to the reduction of fuelbeds over time (Goldammer and Price 1998, Hansen et al. 2003).

Tropical mangroves are also highly threatened by climate change. The principal threat to mangroves comes from sea level rise and the associated changes

Map 2.1 Distribution of the world’s forests by major ecological zone (FAO 2001).


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in sediment dynamics, erosion, and salinity. Sea level rise is expected to take place at about twice the rate of sediment accumulation, which is necessary for the survival of mangroves, and erosion will reduce the size of mangroves (Hansen et al. 2003). Mangroves may be affected by other atmospheric changes as well, including temperature, increased carbon diox-ide, and storms.

The vulnerability of tropical forests is also in-creased by non climatic pressures, such as forest conversion and fragmentation. In the Amazon, the interactions between agricultural expansion, forest fires, and climate change could accelerate the deg-radation process (Nepstad et al. 2008). The ability of species to migrate will be limited by forest frag-mentation, and their ability to colonise new areas will be affected by invasive species (Fischlin et al. 2007). Climate change could be the biggest cause of increased extinction rates in tropical forests (Fischlin et al. 2007), exacerbated by the continued loss of forest cover and forest degradation.

However, many dimensions of the vulnerability of tropical rainforests remain uncertain (Morgan et al. 2001, Wright 2005). Integrated research about these various drivers and their interactions is lack-ing, particularly in the tropics, which impedes the assessment of climate change impacts and vulner-abilities.

2.2.2 Subtropical Forests

Many subtropical forests regularly experience high temperatures and extended droughts, making them particularly susceptible to forest fires. Greater fire frequencies have already been observed in the Medi-terranean basin (Fischlin et al. 2009). According to the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, drought stress has affected vegetation and reduced gross primary production by as much as 30% in southern Europe, resulting in a net carbon source, particularly during the heat wave of 2003 (Fischlin et al. 2007).

Under climate scenarios in the growth cluster, subtropical forests are projected to experience higher evapotranspiration and lower rainfall. Productivity in most subtropical forests is projected to decrease under a wide range of climate-change scenarios due to increases in temperatures above physiological op-timum (Fischlin et al. 2009). Higher temperatures and longer droughts are likely to increase vegetation flammability, leading to more frequent forest fires. However, contrary to the pattern expected in boreal and temperate forests, fire frequencies may reach saturation after an initial stage, or may even dimin-ish when conditions become so dry that decreased production leads to less fuel accumulation (Fischlin et al. 2009). Under more frequent disturbance, espe-

cially fire and drought, carbon stocks are expected to be greatly reduced (Bond et al. 2005).

The subtropics contain some of the most promi-nent biodiversity hotspots in Latin America, Austra-lia, and South Africa. These biodiversity hotspots are highly sensitive to changing climatic conditions under a wide range of climate-change scenarios. Projections suggest that 40% of biodiversity in subtropical forests could be lost even under climate scenarios in the stable cluster (Fischlin et al. 2009). Many subtropical forest species exist in highly frag-mented environments and are at particular risk of extinction, with subsequent negative impacts on the livelihoods of forest-dependent people.

2.2.3 Temperate Forests

There is no evidence yet of widespread change in temperate forest types (Fischlin et al. 2007), although local changes have been reported in southern Swit-zerland (Walther 2000) and in British Columbia (Hebda 2008), and tree lines have advanced in alpine areas (Kullman 2001, Danby and Hik 2007). Lack of major change in temperate forest types should not be surprising, however, as trees in temperate regions are long-lived and most are slow-growing. Physi-ological responses to warmer temperatures have been observed in trees, including longer growing season (Menzel and Fabrian 1999, Piao et al. 2007) and higher production (Boisvenue and Running 2006, Martinez-Vilalta et al. 2008), except where moisture limitation occurs.

Largely based on Sitch et al. (2003), Fischlin et al. (2007) reported broad temperate forest decline and forest type change under the growth (+3.8°C) climate change scenarios. Whereas under the stable (+2°C) scenario, Fischlin et al. (2007) reported relatively less decline, but still considerable forest change was predicted. These conclusions are broadly supported in the literature for all forested continents (Sykes and Prentice 1996, Bugmann 1997, Iverson and Prassad 2002, del Rio et al. 2005, Goldblum and Rigg 2005, Frumhoff et al. 2007, Kellomäki et al. 2008).

The three main disturbances in temperate for-ests include fire, wind, and herbivory (Frelich 2002), along with various pathogens. These will all change in severity, frequency, and in their interactions with climate change (Meehl et al. 2007). Where fire is a factor, it is expected to increase (Cary 2002, Garzon et al. 2008). Temperate forests will also be affected by an increased number of invasive species (Ward and Masters 2007).

Broad range changes in tree species and novel forest types can be expected during the next 70–100 years in temperate forests (Sitch et al. 2003, Fischlin et al. 2007, 2009). Temperate forest communities will

26



change; species will migrate pole-ward, up moun-tains, or be replaced by grasslands and savannahs in drier areas, including areas of the Mediterranean zone (Sykes and Prentice 1996, Bugmann 1997, Iver-son and Prassad 2002, Malcolm et al. 2002, del Rio et al. 2005, Fei and Sen 2005, Goldblum and Rigg 2005, Frumhoff et al. 2007, Keinast et al. 2007, Gar-zon et al. 2008, Koca et al. 2008, Martinez-Vilalta et al. 2008, Fischlin et al. 2009) and in North America (Hamann and Wang 2006, McKenney et al. 2007). High uncertainty is associated with these predictions owing to interactions among increased fire, invasive species, pathogens, and storms (Dale et al. 2001).

Marked species migration and novel ecosystem development is also likely under climate change in temperate forests. There is concern that climate change may exceed the capacity of species with heavy seeds (such as Quercus spp.) to migrate (Malcolm et al. 2002). Original forest species communities are unlikely to reassemble owing to differential species migration capacity and responses to disturbances, and anthropogenically altered landscapes. Migration of species to surrogate habitats may be impeded by the fragmentation of temperate forest landscapes ow-ing to 20th century anthropogenic activity, as well as natural barriers (e.g., mountain ranges, lakes, and seas).

Some research suggests increased productivity in temperate forests in response to climate change (Joyce and Nungesser 2000, Parry 2000) as mod-erated by moisture, and driven by nitrogen levels (Magnani et al. 2007) and soil type (Rasmussen et al. 2008). While nitrogen and CO

2 levels may fertilise

these systems (Milne and van Oijen 2005), any net positive effects in total carbon sequestration may be lost through increased soil respiration or drought (Gough et al. 2008, Noormets et al. 2008, Piao et al. 2008). Under growth scenarios, there is likely to be reductions in carbon sequestration owing to high system respiration and reduced production (Sitch et al. 2003).

2.2.4 Boreal Forests

Current marginal expansion of the boreal forest northwards has been reported, consistent with pre-dictions (Lloyd 2005, Caccianga and Payette 2007, Soja et al. 2007, Devi et al. 2008, MacDonald et al. 2008), but expansion may be slower than expected because of poor soils, fires, and oceanic cooling ef-fects (MacDonald et al. 2008, Payette et al. 2008). The growing season has lengthened (Soja et al. 2007, Kellomäki et al. 2008), and increased growth has been found for some species (Briffa et al. 2008). For other species, temperature threshold effects and important interactions with moisture may occur and

affect individual species responses to climate change (Brooks et al. 1998, Wilmking et al. 2004, Kellomäki et al. 2008). Fire was predicted to increase (Flan-nigan et al. 1998) and has been confirmed in North America and Russia (Gillett et al. 2004, Soja et al. 2007). Warming climate has been implicated as a cause for extensive outbreaks of mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) in western Canada and the USA (Taylor et al. 2006), and of spruce beetle (Dendroctonus rufipennis) in Alaska and northwest-ern Canada (Berg et al. 2006).

The boreal biome is expected to warm more than other forest biomes (Christensen et al. 2007). Under both growth and stable climate change sce-narios, Fischlin et al. (2007) and Sitch et al. (2003) reported predicted broad gains northward for boreal forests, although with conversion to temperate for-ests and grasslands at southern and central areas of Canada and Russia. This is supported in Price and Scott (2006) for Canada, where the biome is ex-pected to increase in area under the growth scenario. Kellomäki et al. (2008) modelled a 44% increase in production from the boreal biome in Finland under the growth scenario.

Soja et al. (2007) summarised published pre-dicted changes for the boreal forest as: increased fire, increased infestation, northward expansion, and altered stand composition and structure. To that list we add less old-growth forest and conversion of southern-central dry forests to grasslands (Thomp-son et al. 1998, Price and Scott 2006). Flannigan et al. (2005) suggests that the area of boreal forests burned in Canada may increase by 74–118% by the end of this century, depending on scenario, but also depending on the frequency of drought years (Fauria and Johnson 2008). Other estimates suggest increases of more than five times current levels in some areas under growth climate change scenarios (Balshi et al. 2008).

Levels of infestation are uncertain but expected to rise owing to drought and warm conditions (Ward and Masters 2007, Fischlin et al. 2009). The tree line should continue to shift northwards, but new com-munities may develop owing to differential response capacity among species (MacDonald et al. 2008). Other threats include the potential for severe insect infestation, and loss of forest cover in southern areas in response to drought and fire.

The estimated total carbon stored in boreal forests is much higher than previously thought and, depend-ing on how the accounting is done, is likely in the range of 25–33% of the total global carbon (Bhatti et al. 2003, Bradshaw et al. 2009), much of it as peat. Climate change may result in increased emission of greenhouse gases through fire and decomposition (Kurz et al. 2008). Greenhouse gases emitted from all Canadian forest fires are estimated to increase from 162 Tg/year of CO

2 equivalent in the 1xCO

2 sce-


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nario to 313 Tg/year of CO2 equivalent in the 3xCO

2

scenario, including contributions from CO2, CH

4,

and N2O (nitrous oxide) (Amiro et al. 2009). While

productivity is expected to rise, net carbon losses are likely to occur owing to increased disturbances and higher respiration (Kurz et al. 2008), depending to a large degree on rates of disturbance and forest management actions (Chen et al. 2008).

2.3 Adaptation for Forests and Forest-Dependent People

In the context of changing economic, social, and global political environments, adaptation to climate change adds new challenges to forest stakeholders (defined as people who depend directly on forests or participate in their management, such as forest communities, forest managers and companies, con-servationists, forest policy makers, development organisations, and scientists). The need to include adaptation into forest management and policies is becoming increasingly recognised by these stake-holders, especially in temperate and boreal areas. In particular, forest stakeholders face challenges related to understanding vulnerability, identifying adapta-tion options, and implementing adaptation.

2.3.1 Understanding Vulnerability

Understanding the vulnerability of forests and forest-dependent people is a first step towards designing effective adaptation. Vulnerability assessments in-clude analysing the determinants of vulnerability and prioritising interventions for reducing the vul-nerability of forests and forest-dependent people. Two main approaches to vulnerability assessments are generally applied to social-ecological systems: “impact-based approaches” (or impact studies) and “vulnerability-based approaches.” Impact-based ap-proaches start with assessing the potential impacts of climate change on forest or forest people under different climate scenarios. Vulnerability-based ap-proaches start with assessing social sensitivity and adaptive capacity to respond to stresses and, if neces-sary, combine this information with impact studies (Kelly and Adger 2000). With vulnerability-based approaches, vulnerability is determined by the ex-isting capacity rather than by any predicted future impacts (Ribot 2009).

For understanding forest vulnerability, many impact studies are available at global or continental scales (e.g., Scholze et al. 2006). However, the coarse resolution of these studies limits their usefulness for informing decisions on adaptation measures at a local

scale. Impact studies can facilitate decision-making if they are conducted at a relevant scale (e.g., national or sub-national) and if they assess uncertainties (e.g., by considering several climate scenarios) (see Box 2.2). It is also important for impact studies to address the factors that enhance or limit the adaptive capacity of forests, such as the process of species migration and the role of landscape connectivity in adaptation (Pearson 2006).

To facilitate adaptation processes for forest-dependent people, vulnerability-based approaches seem more adequate than impact studies (Burton et al. 2002). Most impact-based approaches have failed to facilitate social adaptation processes be-cause the future of both climate and societies is un-certain, because climate scenarios do not necessarily capture the local climatic specificities and relevant variables for local people (e.g., extreme climatic events), and because impact studies operate at a time horizon much further than the ones relevant for people and decision-makers (Mitchell and Hulme 1999, Burton et al. 2002). Some authors argue that vulnerability-based approaches are more likely to identify policy-relevant recommendations for social adaptation because they address immediate needs and are consistent with a precautionary approach to climate change. Reducing social vulnerability to current stresses should help people adapt to the fu-ture climate whatever the future will be (Heltberg et al. 2009).

Impact-based and vulnerability-based approach-es are complementary in the process of planning the adaptation of forests and forest communities. If attention is paid only to reducing current vulner-ability in general, the conclusions could easily lead to recommendations related to a conventional de-velopment approach (e.g., with more education and equity, more stable and diversified livelihoods, or better infrastructure) without addressing future cli-mate risks. While reducing vulnerability to current exposures is relevant, it may not be sufficient for addressing future risks (Lim and Spanger-Siegfried 2005). Impact studies give insights into the potential risks that forests would face in the future and to which societies should be empowered to adapt.

Some issues are important to consider when as-sessing vulnerability. First, cross-scale issues are cru-cial. Adaptation is fundamentally local (Adger et al. 2005a, Agrawal and Perrin 2008), but is influenced by factors from higher scales (e.g., national policies or management at the landscape scale). Assessing the vulnerability of forests and forest-dependent people therefore requires that such cross-scale factors be taken into account. Second, time horizons must be relevant for the decision to be taken (e.g., long term for a long rotation plantation, or more short term for local social adaptation) (Füssel 2007). Third, as the vulnerability of forest people to climate change

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Trevor Murdock

Favouring the establishment of tree species that will be suited to future climate is an important adap-tive response (see Section 2.3). It is challenging to make use of projected future forest impacts in vulnerability assessments because of large uncer-tainties. The case study in this box illustrates how uncertain projections may be used for adaptation in a temperate forest setting. The example is for spruce in British Columbia, Canada.

The resolution (~350 km × 350 km) of GCM (Global Circulation Model) projections is too coarse for assessing impacts in British Columbia due to large climatic gradients over small distances. Simple empirical downscaling to high resolution (~4 km × 4 km) was performed by applying pro-jected climate change from GCMs to high reso-lution historical climatology (Wang et al. 2006). Tree species suitability was approximated using climate envelope techniques (Murdock and Flower 2009).

The difference in projected suitability between climate scenarios in the “growth” and “stable” emissions clusters is considerable. With higher

Figure 2.3 Projected spruce suitability for 2080s in British Columbia: (left) Average for “growth” (A2) scenarios from five GCMs. Light green areas were suitable in both 1961–1990 and in the 2080s, dark green areas become suitable, and dark brown areas lose suitability by 2080s (centre); same for “stable” scenarios (B1). The frame on the right shows the percent of projections from a combined set of ten GCMs following both growth and stable scenarios; dark green indicates agreement between models that the climate will be suitable and brown that it will not be suitable. Reprinted with the permission of Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium.

depends on the state of their forests, and the vulner-ability of forests depends on the people’s decisions, vulnerability assessment should integrate so

forests and society – responding to global drivers of … · 3 forests and society – responding...

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