Abstract
Abstract Forests and human connection with nature have a major impact on human health. Through exercise and recreation in the forest, people receive many benefits from forest ecosystem services (FES) which have a positive impact on their physical and mental health. The paper tackles two main goals i) the first one is an overview of existing literature related to human health and well-being derived from forests in the countries of Central Europe published in the Scopus database. ii) The second goal was to create an overview of policy instruments related to forest cultural services (FCS) in the forest policy documents of selected Central European countries (CEC). A partial goal of the research is to identify gaps and to find a focus of future research in the field of human forest well-being and FES. The results showed that on the national level there is a lack of guidelines for culture services and their anchor in legislative documents. A challenge for the anchor of cultural services is to improve communication between different resort organizations and forest stakeholders. For future research is recommended to survey the forest impact on human health that would provide a base for creating a platform for policy tools related to FCS and help to set up recreation planning in European forests.
Highlights
Forests, trees and green infrastructures provide to the society a plenty of forest ecosystem services (FES) that create healthy living environments for humans
The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of literature available in the SCOPUS database and systematic investigation of Central European countries (CEC) forest policy documents related to the forest, forest cultural services (FCS) and human health
The study examined the anchor of FCS in the main national forest policy documents of selected CEC
Summary
Trees and green infrastructures provide to the society a plenty of forest ecosystem services (FES) that create healthy living environments for humans. The World Health Organization (World Health Organization, 2001) proclaimed that mental well-being is a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community. Their existence is crucial for human populations and life, forest ecosystem services are currently under the pressure of climate change (European Commission, 2019). The knowledge of natural and cultural diversity, spiritual and religious values, intellectual development, educational values, inspiration, aesthetic enjoyment, social relations, sense of place, cultural heritage, recreation, and ecotourism
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