Evolution of forest inventory and management planning system in Lithuania

A forest management plan, the core of forest management, has as its main object the country or forest farm. Implementation of what to factor into annual requirements with a focus on subcompartments is important for research on decision-making support systems of the forest management plan; however, data based on subcompartments is rarely reported. Thus, this study determined a method and technical route for plantation management by compiling subcompartment data to produce management plans. An intelligent selection method of subcompartments needed to establish a management plan was researched, and then a suitability evaluation method of subcompartments and a management plan reasoning method of subcompartments were selected. Next, a Forest Subcompartment Management Plan Assistant Decision-Making System was designed and implemented. The forest management plan was analyzed by forest management experts, and a knowledge base and inference engine of a decision support system were built. This system used production rules according to the state of the stand, site conditions, management objectives, and other conditions to determine management choices. From this an intelligent design and manually aided design were developed using Visual Studio 2008 and ArcGIS Engine 9.3 as developing tools, and Access as the database engine to complete construction of the system. The system could help users intelligently selected management subcompartments based on management assignment, then compiled subcompartments management plan by two ways, which were provided by the system. It could be used in forest farms, solved forest management with effective choices and management plan compilation assistance problems and effectively improved the digital level of forest management.

The earliest American forest resource management plans date to the birth of the forestry profession around 1900. For the next half century, these management plans were essentially timber production management plans. Certainly, other forest values, especially watershed protection, were important parts of the planning. But not until the second half of the twentieth century did multiple-use and a wide array of forest values become normal components of a forest management plan. Within the last twenty-five years forest management plans have developed a forest stewardship or sustainable forest management foundation. That is, a forest resource management plan is now expected to consider an entire set of forest values, to have a long-term sustainability focus, and to meet a set of expected management and operational criteria. Often, the forest management plan is the basis of a forest certification scheme. The early forest management plans were primarily timber-based and thus had a commercial or financial focus. Today’s forest management plans are based on multiple forest values and may or may not have a financial focus. We contrast the traditional timber management plan with today’s sustainable forest management plan, realizing the basis of both plans is by definition the forest or the timber. Involving both timber harvesting activities and the operational foundation of the sustainable forest management plan is essentially a timber management plan. One cannot ignore the fact that all forest management plans accomplish silvicultural objectives via manipulation of timber density variables, like stocking and spacing. Management of a forest still involves timber harvests. Our discussion shows that the timber management plan is still very much alive and forms the basis of modern sustainable forest management plans.

Forest resource management planning began in the United States at the turn of the nineteenth century with an emphasis on timber production, sustained yield, and maximum timber growth. A set of well-documented procedures, philosophies, rules, and understandings developed within the forestry profession on the reasons for and requirements of a professionallydeveloped forest resource management plan. For most of the next decade, this framework controlled the development of timber-oriented forest management plans. In the late twentieth century, the forest resource management plans became stewardship- or sustainability-oriented. A broader expansive framework that stressed sustainable forest management developed. However, the framework of both types of plans is fundamentally the same. The natural resource being manipulated is still timber and that is the variable the management plan still focuses on. The set of fundamental underpinnings to the forest management plan has not changed. We describe these underpinnings in terms of both types of forest management plan, as they have remained unchanged over time. Also addressed are the questions of who are the forest owners that plan and what are the differences in the type of forest management plans they prepare.

Forest policy and decision-makers are challenged by the need to balance the increasing demand for multiple ecosystem services while addressing the impacts of natural disturbances (e.g., wildfires, droughts, wind, insect attacks) and global change scenarios (e.g., climate change) on its potential supply. This challenge motivates the development of a framework for incorporating concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services in multiple criteria management planning contexts. Thus, the paper focused on both the analysis of the current state-of-the art research in forest management planning and the development of a conceptual framework to accommodate various components in a forest management process. On the basis of a thorough recent classification of forest management planning problems and the state-of-the-art research, we defined the key dimensions of the framework and the process. The emphasis was on helping to identify how concerns with a wide range of ecosystem services may be analyzed and better understood by forest ecosystem management planning. This research discusses the potential of contemporary management planning approaches to address multiple forest ecosystem services. It highlights the need for a multi-level perspective and appropriate spatial resolution to integrate multiple ecosystem services. It discusses the importance of methods and tools that may help support stakeholders’ involvement and public participation in hierarchical planning processes. The research addresses the need of methods and tools that may encapsulate the ecological, economic, and social complexity of forest ecosystem management to provide an efficient plan, information about tradeoffs between ecosystem services, and the sensitivity of the plan to uncertain parameters (e.g., prices, climate change) on time.

State of forest fund and planning in forestry

Spiritual values are part of major global forest-related policies and strategies for sustainable forest management. Despite ongoing research and current debates, the significance of spiritual values in sustainable forest management in the Global North remains under-theorised. As Forest Management Plans represent an important nexus between policies and practices, this study clarifies the significance of spiritual values in forest management plans. We applied a conceptual framework with nine ‘dimensions of spirituality’ to investigate ten plans from British Columbia (Canada) and ten plans from the Netherlands, deploying qualitative analysis through descriptive coding in Atlas.ti. We elicited and compared the spiritual dimensions represented in the underlying principles, objectives, and operational sections of forest management plans for both geographical locations. Their widespread occurrence suggests that spiritual values are considered essential elements of sustainable forest policy and management in the Global North, also in contexts with non-Indigenous populations. We grouped the articulations of the spiritual dimensions in Forest Management Plans into three themes: ‘Nature Experience’, ‘Spiritual Use’ and ‘History’. A comparison of the spiritual dimensions across these themes and geographical locations yields the following insights: 1) spiritual values of forests are not only articulated in the strategic sections of forest management plans, but also in operational sections; 2) in management planning, forest spirituality is not only strongly related to experience, but also to the (‘wise’) use of forests and to forest-related history; 3) Spiritual values are better operationalised in adaptive forms of management planning than in formal ‘technical’ planning structures. This offers new ways of understanding the role of spirituality in forests management plans and contributes new insights to current debates in forest science.

This study aimed to estimate a taper equation for eucalyptus trees growing in Nineveh Governorate, it is used in forest inventory or management planning systems, giving information about the diameter at any point along the main stem of the tree. Data were collected from three naturally growing trees for diameter at breast height, total height, and diameter at different levels, starting from 0.5 m above ground level, with distances of half a meter along the main stem, using computer and regression methods. different. Linear and non-linear. In the preparation of the taper equation, as well as the use of statistical measures, namely, the coefficient of determination R2, the standard error attributed to the S.E rate, in the test of the best taper equation, and through the comparison between equations through statistical measures, we were able to obtain the following taper equation: d = 14.2299 * hi -0.1873 And by taking the integration of the taper equation, we got an equation for estimating the size of eucalyptus trees, which is:V1 = 0.02542(hi)0.6254.

Wildfires impact the outcomes of forest management plans. Addressing that impact is thus critical for effective forest ecosystem management planning. This paper presents research on the use of multiple criteria decision making (MCDM) methods that integrate wildfire risk in planning contexts characterized by multiple objectives. Specifically, an a posteriori preference modeling approach is developed that adds wildfire criteria to a set of objectives representing ecosystem services supply values. Wildfire risk criteria are derived from stand-level wildfire occurrence and damage models as well as from the characteristics of neighboring stands that may impact wildfire probability and spread. A forested landscape classified into 1976 stands is used for testing purposes. The management planning criteria include the carbon stock, harvest volumes for three forest species, the volume of the ending inventory, and resistance to wildfire risk indicators. Results show the potential of multiple criteria decision making methods to provide information about trade-offs between wildfire risk and the supply of provisioning (timber) as well as regulatory (carbon) ecosystem services. This information may contribute to the effectiveness of forest ecosystem management planning.

Forest Landscape Management Plan (FLMP) is intended to have an intermediate role between forest management plans on a regional level and forest management on a unit level. FLMP addresses long-term management issues, with special attention to social and environmental functions, normally not meticulously considered when working on a single forest property level. This paper presents a method to evaluate forest multifunctionality, in order to define management guidelines and support forest planning. A FLMP was conducted in a district of the Basilicata region (Italy). A total of 92 inventory plots comprising the main forest types: i) turkey oak, Hungarian oak, and sessile oak forests (Quercus cerris L. dominant), ii) downy oak forests (Quercus pubescens Willd. dominant), iii) Mediterranean evergreen oak forests (Quercus ilex L. dominant), were considered. Technicians evaluated the multifunctionality of each area by estimating — in the context of an Index of Importance of Function (I) — the capacity of each forest to fulfil different functions. The index was successively aggregated according to forest type and forest system (high forest and coppice). The results showed that the higher level of multifunctionality was found in the high forests. According to the synthetic indicators of multifunctionality, the turkey oak forests obtained the highest values among all forest types. The last part of the paper illustrates an approach to multi-functional forest management, analysing how different silvicultural systems are able to fulfil the main forest functions. This method, as shown in the results, seems to provide a useful support for technicians to evaluate multifunctionality related to forest types and different silvicultural treatments.

This chapter presents an overview on historical and current forestry and forest management in China. Although China’s natural forests had greatly reduced over the past several centuries due mainly to agricultural development, over-exploration and wars, there has been a sustained growth in total forest area and volume for several decades partly because of the implementation of several national key forestry programs aiming at biodiversity conservation and sustainable forestry development. China’s forest resource today is still insufficient because of low quality and productivity, and inadequate forest management. The major problems of forest management in China include deficiency in linking forest management with end usage, inadequate forest health management, lack of integrated forest landscape management, and unbalanced consideration on economy over environment. Forest management must address increasing concerns on challenges and emerging global issues, of which climate change is identified as the most severe threat. To tackle the existing problems and cope with uncertainties in changing environmental conditions with climate change, landscape ecology can play a major role in facilitating sustainable forest management (SFM) by providing theories and management tools for forest restoration, biodiversity conservation, land and water resource management and forest landscape planning. Forest management practices that consider spatial heterogeneity, pattern-process, disturbance regime, scale and spatial-temporal context of forest landscapes beyond forest boundary are increasingly adopted by forest researchers and managers in China. However, more research is needed to enhance long-term forest ecosystem monitoring, develop cross-scale and multiple-purpose forest management guidelines, improve landscape decision support systems, and formulate integrated ecosystem management policies and practices so that forest landscape management can be adapted to climate change and landscape sustainability can be strengthened.

Nowadays, improving forest management is done by way of amendments to the forest management instructions, silvicultural rules and forest protection instructions. From the point of view of forest management, the most important is the forest management plan, the basic document prepared for a specific object, containing a description and assessment of the state of the forest, as well as the objectives, tasks and ways of forest management. Before each subsequent revision of the forest management guidelines, new instructions are developed in consultation with the public, based on discussions on the proposed changes that are in each case to serve as the best plan for forest management. The forest management plan is vital as it ties together silviculture, conservation, production and non-production purposes as well as social forestry tasks, but only if the primary and operational nature of the objectives considered at the stage of creating the plan are recognized. Therefore, the role of forest management in shaping and protecting the environment cannot be overestimated. In this work, we outline the basic principles and rights related to both, forest management under various forms of ownership, as well as detailed guidelines for the content of the forest management plan. We found that the specificity of mountain forests requires the use of different rules and methods. Taking into account the existing rich scientific achievements, it is tempting to attempt to develop forest management instructions specifically for mountain forests, whether in the form of a separate chapter or a separate publication. The basic problem with forest management under other forms of ownership (urban, experimental, private forests) is the lack of a detailed legal basis accounting for their specific nature. Therefore, appropriate steps should be taken towards introducing appropriate new or supplementary provisions into the forest legislation, which would allow for the development of modern standards. For the State Forests, forest management instructions should be prepared by a team of experts appointed by the Minister of the Environment who will approve the finished document for official use. The forest management plan should include an economic annex focused on the forecast of the expected financial result, including costs associated with a deviation from the optimal due to social or protective reasons.

A thorough assessment of various forest management planning initiatives and development of improvement strategies towards an ecosystem-based planning

The measurements of tree attributes required for forest monitoring and management planning, e.g., National Forest Inventories, are derived by rather time-consuming field measurements on sample plots, using calipers and measurement tapes. Therefore, forest managers and researchers are looking for alternative methods. Currently, terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) is the remote sensing method that provides the most accurate point clouds at the plot-level to derive these attributes from. However, the demand for even more efficient and effective solutions triggers further developments to lower the acquisition time, costs, and the expertise needed to acquire and process 3D point clouds, while maintaining the quality of extracted tree parameters. In this context, photogrammetry is considered a potential solution. Despite a variety of studies, much uncertainty still exists about the quality of photogrammetry-based methods for deriving plot-level forest attributes in natural forests. Therefore, the overall goal of this study is to evaluate the competitiveness of terrestrial photogrammetry based on structure from motion (SfM) and dense image matching for deriving tree positions, diameters at breast height (DBHs), and stem curves of forest plots by means of a consumer grade camera. We define an image capture method and we assess the accuracy of the photogrammetric results on four forest plots located in Austria and Slovakia, two in each country, selected to cover a wide range of conditions such as terrain slope, undergrowth vegetation, and tree density, age, and species. For each forest plot, the reference data of the forest parameters were obtained by conducting field surveys and TLS measurements almost simultaneously with the photogrammetric acquisitions. The TLS data were also used to estimate the accuracy of the photogrammetric ground height, which is a necessary product to derive DBHs and tree heights. For each plot, we automatically derived tree counts, tree positions, DBHs, and part of the stem curve from both TLS and SfM using a software developed at TU Wien (Forest Analysis and Inventory Tool, FAIT), and the results were compared. The images were oriented with errors of a few millimetres only, according to checkpoint residuals. The automatic tree detection rate for the SfM reconstruction ranges between 65% and 98%, where the missing trees have average DBHs of less than 12 cm. For each plot, the mean error of SfM and TLS DBH estimates is −1.13 cm and −0.77 cm with respect to the caliper measurements. The resulting stem curves show that the mean differences between SfM and TLS stem diameters is at maximum −2.45 cm up to 3 m above ground, which increases to almost +4 cm for higher elevations. This study shows that with the adopted image capture method, terrestrial SfM photogrammetry, is an accurate solution to support forest inventory for estimating the number of trees and their location, the DBHs and stem curve up to 3 m above ground.

In the last 25 years, the number of published studies that refer to traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) has constantly increased, with now more than 200 papers published each year. The objective of this review was to determine how this knowledge is used in current forest management around the world, and how local communities are involved in forest management planning. Published papers from 1983 to 2005 relating to TEK were found using the ISI Web of Science database. Despite the growing amount of literature published on TEK, we found only 21 studies that specifically address forest management per se. In these studies, TEK integration took different paths: using traditional management rules as a framework (five studies), using value maps to adapt practices in time and space (three studies), or by a zoning process that divides the land into areas in which different land uses are emphasized (six studies). Some community involvements are “active” with co-management committees composed of stakeholders (including community members), each having a voice; some are “passive” with external managers using criteria and indicators previously developed from community values and objectives. Although important changes in mentality and firm political decisions are still required before more efficient partnership between TEK and western science is reached in forest management planning, our review showed that Canadian initiatives proposed promising processes that could ensure better TEK incorporation and improved community participation. Key words: traditional ecological knowledge, TEK, sustainable forest management, community participation, first nations, forest management planning

Forest management is currently challenged by the need to address an increasing demand for a wide range of ecosystem services. Addressing this challenge requires landscape-level supply approaches that may bring together multiple interests and goals of forest actors. Characterizing these interests and the corresponding forest management context is thus a prerequisite for an effective landscape-level approach. In this manuscript we develop actor analysis to characterize a forest management context. We implement and test the analysis in Vale do Sousa, in North-Western Portugal. The analysis encompassed the identification of key actors and 40 interviews. Results show that the analysis provides a thorough diagnosis of the current forest management context in Vale do Sousa. The findings give a snapshot of the actors and factors – interests, influential actors, conflicts, problems and power resources – that frame forest decisions. Specifically, results show the keen interest of all groups on wood provisioning and on regulating wildfires. However, actors have also revealed a strong interest in water quality, soil erosion prevention, biodiversity, landscape aesthetics and environmental education. Thus, there is a significant interest in the diversification of the provision of ecosystem services. Almost half of the actors have identified the multifunctional forest as being the ideal forest management framework for Vale do Sousa. Findings thus evince the potential of a participatory approach to negotiate a consensual landscape-level solution that may integrate the different actors' interests and provide a wide range of ecosystem services. This may be facilitated by another finding from actor analysis. A regional Forest Owners Association was recognized as the most influential actor and may support the development and negotiation of multiple objective landscape-level forest ecosystem management plans. In summary, these results may contribute to a better understanding of the forest management context in Vale do Sousa and to supporting the effectiveness of forest management planning. They may contribute further to anticipate problems and conflicts and to develop with actors from Vale do Sousa participatory processes to address them.