Private Forest Owners Research Articles

Which factors spur forest owners' collaboration over forest waters?

Collaborative river basin governance has been advocated both by research and legislation, while at the same time certain silvicultural practices are shown to lead to deteriorating water quality. In order for collaboration to be initiated, however, the majority of key stakeholders must be willing to participate. This paper investigates which factors at the local level are crucial for initiating collaboration over forest waters among individual private forest owners. For that purpose, a survey was sent out to all individual forest owners within a catchment area in northern Sweden. The survey was complemented by a qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews. The existence of several key preconditions for the initiation of collaboration was investigated, namely: low belief and cultural heterogeneity, information diffusion, perception of the problem, existing stores of social capital, interdependence, and leadership. The results show that although the context was one of low belief and cultural heterogeneity, individual private forest owners are not interested in collaborating for improved forest water unless they perceive the issue of water quality important enough to invest resources in collaboration. It also became clear that the diffusion of information about the problem is not reaching those stakeholders who are crucial for the commencement of collaboration. Moreover, those stakeholders do not recognise their interdependence on each other for resolving the issue and therefore the need for collaboration. Finally, initiating leadership was also found to be lacking, leading to the conclusion that to successfully implement policies requiring collaborative management of natural resources among highly empowered individual forest owners, those missing factors need to be addressed by the state.

Private Forests in Nepal: Status and Policy Analysis

This paper reviews and analyses the present status of private forests and tenure administration in light of existing legal, policy, and regulatory frameworks in Nepal. Additionally, the present status of private forests, as well as the scenarios of timber harvesting, transportation, marketing, and their administration are thoroughly revised. Provisions regarding forests and trees on private land and their basis are examined and implications are articulated for potential policy improvements for enhanced tenure security. It is shown that robust national-level policies and legal frameworks exist, and that there is an increasing trend of timber flows to markets from private forests over the past five years. However, there is still skepticism, mistrust and fear amongst private forest owners, saw millers, and forest administration that prevents the full use of the bundle of rights that legal and policy provisions have promised. An unusually slow pace of private forest registration, lengthy and multi stage processes for obtaining harvesting and transportation permits, and official bans on important commercial species, among others, are found to be the factors that most hinder the private forest owners’ and tree growers’ interests, and their rights and obligations with respect to the management and use of their private forest resources. It is concluded that a simplified permitting process along with programmatic support would promote and help to grow private forestry and that Nepal’s experience and lessons learned from community forest implementation would be a great asset to move towards this end. Connecting community forest user groups for organised and cooperative action, and mobilising their institutional strength and accumulated funds for pro-farmer technical and regulatory support would allow farmers to intensify tree plantations and forest management. Further steps are required to convince policymakers and secure necessary budgetary support to this end..

Do forest decision-makers in Southeastern Norway adapt forest management to climate change?

ABSTRACTTo study whether, why, and how forestry decision-makers in Southeastern Norway adapt to climate change, we conducted a series of semi-structured interviews in focus groups consisting of non-industrial private forest owners, forest managers, and forest advisors. Our results show that a majority of the participants believed in climate change as a phenomenon, and had experienced events or observed changes that they attributed to climate change. However, we found little evidence of concern regarding climate change impacts on forest ecosystems and forestry among the participants. Instead, the majority regarded climate change more as an opportunity for the Norwegian forest-based sector than a threat. A minority had implemented proactive practices motivated by climate change but in all but one case, the adjustments were adaptation of forest infrastructure. In general, the participants agreed that the uncertainty associated with the effects of climate change and the (economical) uncertainty associated with adaptation of forest ecosystems were too large to change forest management practices at present. However, many participants, in particular the managers, are already adapting in response to experienced problems, such as increased frequency and duration of periods with low carrying capacity of the ground implying reduced or no accessibility within and to stands.

昭和60年林業動態調査と中小・零細林家の位置づけの再検討 : 坂口精吾氏「林家経営の最近の動向について」のコメントにかえて(テーマ:林業経営の最近の動向について,1987年度第1回例会報告)

昭和60年林業動態調査と中小・零細林家の位置づけの再検討 : 坂口精吾氏「林家経営の最近の動向について」のコメントにかえて(テーマ:林業経営の最近の動向について,1987年度第1回例会報告)

オーストリアにおける丸太の生産・流通構造の変化について : シュタイヤーマルク州の小中規模林家を中心として

オーストリアにおける丸太の生産・流通構造の変化について : シュタイヤーマルク州の小中規模林家を中心として

報告2. 低成長下の大規模林業経営の構造変化 : 「剣山開発」の終息と変ぼう( テーマ 大規模林業経営の展開と性格,1985年度秋季大会報告)

報告2. 低成長下の大規模林業経営の構造変化 : 「剣山開発」の終息と変ぼう( テーマ 大規模林業経営の展開と性格,1985年度秋季大会報告)

The Willingness of Non-Industrial Private Forest Owners to Enter California's Carbon Offset Market.

While non-industrial private forest landowners have a significant amount of forest landholdings in the US, they are underrepresented in the California cap-and-trade market forest offset program. Additional participation could benefit both the market and non-industrial private forest landowners. We developed a mail questionnaire which served as both a survey instrument and outreach tool about the market. Questions covered forest ownership objectives, landowners' future plans for forests, views of climate change, and attitudes and intentions regarding forest carbon offset project development. We sampled from five Northern California counties for a total of 143 usable surveys. Three different groups of landowners were identified based on their management objectives: amenity (including protecting nature and recreation); legacy (passing land to children and/or maintaining a farm or ranch); and income. Landowner objective groups differed on several key variables, particularly related to potential motivations for joining the market, while all landowners expressed concerns about protocol requirements. Regardless of ownership objectives, over half expressed that receiving revenue from their forests would be an important motivator to join, though most were unwilling to satisfy protocol requirements, even after learning of the potential benefits of program participation. Thus, participation appears to be limited by the costly and complex project development process, as well as a lack of landowner awareness. Extending these lessons, we assert that different landowners may approach payment for ecosystem services programs with different needs, awareness, and motivations, which provide important lessons for those who conduct landowner outreach and for PES program designers.

Implementasi Penatausahaan Hasil Hutan Hak di Kabupaten Polewali Mandar Sulawesi Barat

Position forest rights as one of the supporting timber availability in the industry can not be separated from the challenges and dynamics of forest product administration. It required a review of management of forest products from the forest rights in its implementation. This study aims to analyze the implementation of the rights of forest product administration in Polewali Mandar, using descriptive analysis with the existing indicators on variables and dimensions were obtained in accordance with the guidelines for the interview. The results of analysis tools provide the opportunity regulatory administration of forest products to the widest public / private forest owners as well as the adjustment of government policy related to the field of forestry sustainable forest management (SFM) and Timber Legality Verification (VLK). Implementation of the regulatory activities in the form of socialization only held one and the absence of formal socialization to the new set of rules; Issuing Certificates of Origin (SKAU) wood as much as 33 (thirty-three) of 144 (one hundred and forty-four) villages, yet the publisher SKAU set by BP2HP; SKAU publishing process by following the same line district offices are not in line with existing regulations and create problems in terms of time, cost and control; The lack of reporting of forest production and recapitulation SKAU Publisher SKAU to the district forestry department reporting that impact the realization of the production and distribution of forest products are not going well right. Implementation of the management of forest products in Polewali Mandar rights do not go according to Forestry Minister Regulation No. P.30 / Menhut-II / 2012 are rearranged in the Minister of Environment and Forestry No. P.21 / MenLHK-II / 2015 on the administration of forest products of forest rights

The order of forest owners' discourses: Hegemonic and marginalised truths about the forest and forest ownership

Our understanding of the world is essentially based on shared meanings that are intersubjectively produced and reproduced in different social practices. In this study we analyse private forest owners’ discourses of the forest as a social practice that produces alternative competing truths about the forest and forest ownership. We examine the order of five predefined discourses (1–5) in relation to discoursal power by analysing the signs of hegemony and marginalisation within these discourses. Importantly, we also analyse the position of different kinds of forest owners within the prevailing order of discourses. Our critical discourse analysis combines qualitative content analysis with quantitative multivariate analysis (NMS) and is based on in-depth interviews with 24 Finnish forest owners.The harmonious discourses of the forester (1) and the economist (2) demonstrated many hegemonic features. This essentially illustrates the hegemony of the economic truth about the forest and its proper use among forest owners, as economically effective wood production was emphasised in both of these discourses. The signs of marginalization were common in the discourses of the distant economist (3), the critical anti-economist (4), and the dutiful forest owner (5). Discourse 4 was characterised by an open critique of the hegemonic economic truth. Forest owners with primarily non-monetary objectives were placed in an unfavourable position in the order of the discourses.The results reflect a wider discursive environment where economic meanings and practices prevail as the most natural and proper ways of thinking and acting. Being a forest owner is easy in Finnish society if the hegemonic economic truth about the forest functions as a natural and unproblematic part of one's forest ownership. However, discourses 4 and 5 indicate that the prevailing discursive conditions make forest ownership unfulfilling for some owners. Openness to alternative ways to understand the forest and forest ownership should thus be enhanced in research, policy, practical forestry, and the media.

Attitude Towards Risk and Production Decision: an Empirical Analysis on French Private Forest Owners

This paper deals with the forest owner’s attitude towards risk and the harvesting decision in several ways. First, we propose to characterize and quantify the forest owner’s attitude towards risk. Second, we analyze the determinants of the forest owner’s risk attitude. Finally, we determine the impact of the forest owner’s risk attitude on the harvesting decision. The French forest owner’s risk attitude is tackled by implementing a questionnaire, including a context-free measure borrowed from experimental economics. The determinants of the forest owner’s risk attitude and harvesting decision are estimated through a recursive bivariate ordered probit model. We show that French forest owners are characterized by a relative risk aversion coefficient close to 1 with a DARA assumption. In addition, we find that the forest owner’s risk aversion is influenced positively and significantly by the level of risk exposure, the geographical location of the forest and the fact to be a forester, and negatively by the income. Finally, we obtain that the forest owner’s risk aversion has a positive and significant impact on the harvesting decision.

Evaluating the Economic Potential of Uneven-aged Maritime Pine Forests

Continuous cover practices are likely to better respond to the increasing demand for social, aesthetic and environmental values provided by forest ecosystems than even-aged forest plantations. Also, uneven-aged forestry may be especially attractive for non-industrial private forest owners, as it provides more regular revenues and, by taking advantage of natural regeneration, reduce installation costs. Knowledge on alternative regimes to even-aged forestry is therefore in high demand. We first add to the literature by proposing a new maritime pine forest growth model that can be readily used in optimization studies. Second, we are the first to analyze optimal uneven aged forest management for this species. Highlighting the contribution of this study, a comparison of our results with currently suggested silvicultural management scenarios is provided. We show that the economic profitability of this species significantly increases under optimal forest management and may thus present a viable alternative to rotation forests. In particular, we show that optimal forest management may entail harvesting cycles.

Understanding private forest owners’ conceptualisation of forest management: Evidence from a survey in seven European countries

Private forest owners' involvement in forest management has been frequently examined through the attitudes, values, beliefs, objectives and motivations associated with owning and managing forestland. Owners' views on forest management do not always align with those of policymakers who believe forest owners do not actively manage their forests. However, empirical studies on forest owners' conceptualisations of forest management are scarce. To determine how private forest owners in Europe conceptualise forest management, a survey (n = 1140) was undertaken in seven European countries (Portugal, France, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia and Romania). The owners were asked to indicate their level of agreement with 19 pre-tested statements defining forest management on a five-point Likert scale. Classification and regression trees were used to explain the major factors that influenced owners' conceptualisations. Owners primarily conceptualised forest management as preserving forests for future generations and considered “a good business opportunity”, “an opportunity to earn additional money” or a “source of subsidies” less important. Their understanding of forest management as a mixture of forest maintenance, ecosystem stewardship and economic activity does not match with alleged policy makers’ views. Property size, age and Eastern/Western countries were the most relevant predictors of definitions of forest management. Small-scale forest owners from Western Europe considered ecosystem orientation more important, while owners from Eastern Europe considered economic aspects and forest maintenance more important. These differences might be associated with the socio-political system dynamics in Europe in the 20th century and changing values in post-modern society. Policymakers must be aware of the different forest management paradigms among forest owners in Eastern-Central and Western Europe when designing European forest policies.

The emergence of the European Union Timber Regulation: How Baptists, Bootleggers, devil shifting and moral legitimacy drive change in the environmental governance of global timber trade

The European Union Timber Regulation (EUTR) was adopted in 2010. This Regulation prohibits placing illegally harvested timber on the EU market and obliges economic operators who put timber products for the first time on the EU market to exercise due diligence. So far, little research has been done to understand the politics of the EUTR. Based on 25 interviews with key informants and the analysis of 32 policy documents, this paper explains the emergence of the Regulation as a result of coalitional politics driven by both conflict and cooperation among state and non-state actors. We show that the politics of the EUTR is marked by heated policy debates and mistrust, in particular in regards to the prohibition clause and the relation between legality and sustainability. Domestic timber producers (public and private forest owners), forest industry (sawmilling, furniture, pulp and paper) and forest-rich EU member states (e.g. Austria, Germany, Finland and Sweden) represented in the Council built a CONTRA-coalition that were (initially) opposed to the regulatory changes suggested by the PRO-coalition of environmental groups and the European Parliament. The Regulation emerged through a strategic alliance between environmental groups, timber import-dependent forest industries and retailers. This “Baptists-and-Bootleggers” alliance was facilitated by an overlap of environmentalists' beliefs and moral arguments (emphasizing the negative societal and ecological impacts of illegal logging) and timber industries' economic interests (protectionism and market expansion as well as reputational improvement). The EUTR was finally adopted through the political support of national authorities of EU member states who are timber import-dependent (the UK, the Netherlands and Denmark), and the European Parliament. The paper concludes with a reflection on the importance of coalitional politics for policy change at the nexus between environmental, trade and market policies.

Is forest insurance a relevant vector to induce adaptation efforts to climate change?

Insurance might be an efficient tool to strengthen adaptation of forest management to climate change. A theoretical model under uncertainty is proposed to highlight the effect, on adaptation decisions, of considering adaptation efforts in forest insurance contracts. Results show that insurance is relevant to increase adaptation efforts under some realistic conditions on forest owner’s uncertainty and risk preferences, and on the observability or not of adaptation efforts. One of the challenges of forest adaptation to climate change is to encourage private forest owners to implement adaptation strategies. We suggest the analysis of forest insurance contracts against natural hazards as a vector to promote the implementation of adaptation efforts by private forest owners. We propose a theoretical model of insurance economics under risk and under uncertainty. Our results indicate that when climate change makes the probability of the occurrence of the natural event uncertain, then it may be relevant to include adaptation efforts in the insurance contract, leading to an increase in the adaptation efforts of risk-averse and uncertainty-averse forest owners. In addition, we show that the relevance of insurance as a vector to promote adaptation efforts is greater when the forest owner’s effort is unobservable by the insurer as compared to a situation of perfectly observable effort. Under some realistic assumptions, the forest insurance contract seems to be a relevant tool to encourage forest owners to adapt to climate change.

Management urbaner Wälder zwischen Ansprüchen der Gesellschaft und Besitzerzielen

Management of urban woodlands between demands of society and owner objectives Urban woodlands provide numerous ecosystem services for the society. However, they depend on the management goals, motivations and interests of the forest owners. In the Munich Metropolitan Region, it was examined how the population perceive the woodlands and which services of the woodlands are most important for them. On the other hand management goals, interests and motivation of forest owners were assessed by interviewing representatives of state, communal and private forest owners in urban area. It turned out that both population and forest owners had quite similar ideas about the services urban woodlands should deliver. For many forest owners, timber production was of little importance. The main objective was creating and maintaining stable and ecologically valuable mixed stands. In the everyday perception of the population, there is a deep fear of losing woodlands for urban development. Forest management actions are often associated with a general loss of forest. To avoid conflicts, communication and information should be improved. To provide attractive forest consultancy for urban woodland owners, forest authorities and forest associations should include topics such as forest aesthetics, nature conservation, pest control, legal duty to maintain safety, recreation and visitor management.

享保度林・新立林と私林・民有林の形成 : 木曽官民有区分の一側面(2009年度シンポジウム 国有林史料から見た新しい地域史像)

享保度林・新立林と私林・民有林の形成 : 木曽官民有区分の一側面(2009年度シンポジウム 国有林史料から見た新しい地域史像)

Bayesian methods to estimate urban growth potential

Urban growth often influences the production of ecosystem services. The impacts of urbanization on landscapes can subsequently affect landowners’ perceptions, values and decisions regarding their land. Within land-use and land-change research, very few models of dynamic landscape-scale processes like urbanization incorporate empirically-grounded landowner decision-making processes. Very little attention has focused on the heterogeneous decision-making processes that aggregate to influence broader-scale patterns of urbanization. We examine the land-use tradeoffs faced by individual landowners in one of the United States’ most rapidly urbanizing regions − the urban area surrounding Charlotte, North Carolina. We focus on the land-use decisions of non-industrial private forest owners located across the region’s development gradient. A discrete choice experiment is used to determine the critical factors influencing individual forest owners’ intent to sell their undeveloped properties across a series of experimentally varied scenarios of urban growth. Data are analyzed using a hierarchical Bayesian approach. The estimates derived from the survey data are used to modify a spatially-explicit trend-based urban development potential model, derived from remotely-sensed imagery and observed changes in the region’s socioeconomic and infrastructural characteristics between 2000 and 2011. This modeling approach combines the theoretical underpinnings of behavioral economics with spatiotemporal data describing a region’s historical development patterns. By integrating empirical social preference data into spatially-explicit urban growth models, we begin to more realistically capture processes as well as patterns that drive the location, magnitude and rates of urban growth.

Analysis of Swedish Forest Owners' Information and Knowledge-Sharing Networks for Decision-Making: Insights for Climate Change Communication and Adaptation.

To further the understanding of climate change adaptation processes, more attention needs to be paid to the various contextual factors that shape whether and how climate-related knowledge and information is received and acted upon by actors involved. This study sets out to examine the characteristics of forest owners' in Sweden, the information and knowledge-sharing networks they draw upon for decision-making, and their perceptions of climate risks, their forests' resilience, the need for adaptation, and perceived adaptive capacity. By applying the concept of ego-network analysis, the empirical data was generated by a quantitative survey distributed to 3000 private forest owners' in Sweden in 2014 with a response rate of 31%. The results show that there is a positive correlation, even though it is generally weak, between forest owner climate perceptions and (i) network features, i.e. network size and heterogeneity, and (ii) presence of certain alter groups (i.e. network members or actors). Results indicate that forest owners' social networks currently serve only a minimal function of sharing knowledge of climate change and adaptation. Moreover, considering the fairly infrequent contact between respondents and alter groups, the timing of knowledge sharing is important. In conclusion we suggest those actors that forest owners' most frequently communicate with, especially forestry experts providing advisory services (e.g. forest owner associations, companies, and authorities) have a clear role to communicate both the risks of climate change and opportunities for adaptation. Peers are valuable in connecting information about climate risks and adaptation to the actual forest property.

What to do with mushroom pickers in my forest? Policy tools from the landowners’ perspective

Wild mushroom picking is a growing recreational and commercial activity. In Spain, wild mushrooms legally belong to the landowner, who seldom benefits from trade in mushrooms or from their recreational value. Cultural aspects (tradition, picker-related harms) and economic aspects (costly forestry works, income opportunities) constitute elements of the debate on how to deal with mushroom picking. Through a survey of private forest owners in Catalonia (north-eastern Spain), this paper examines their experiences with mushroom pickers, the factors shaping their related policy preferences and their willingness to engage in mushroom reserves.The results show broad support for introducing mushroom picking norms. A regulation would allow outsider pickers to enter private land, but only under certain conditions, i.e. to comply with socio-ecological rules of the area. Among respondents who support the regulation, active land owners who report instances of picker-related harm (both tangible and intangible) tend to support the establishment of a fee system which could be reinvested into forest management. That is also the position of the respondents who perceive mushrooms as a private right, i.e. they believe to have a legitimate right to exclude outsider pickers and, eventually, to raise revenues from that asset. On the contrary, forest owners who conceive mushroom picking as a free-access activity prefer neither to regulate it nor to charge fees. The option to establish a mushroom picking reserve depends on the landholder being a fee-supporter and perceiving instances of harm. Harm, instead, is mainly determined by the perception of congestion of pickers, which in turn is determined by the mushroom productivity of their forest, their level of privacy protection and their involvement to the primary sector. These findings help policymakers to better understand the logic and sensitivities of forest owners in view of designing mushroom picking policies that can effectively solve picker-landowner conflicts.

Forest owners' discourses of forests: Ideological origins of ownership objectives

We still understand inadequately how ideological shared meanings affect private forest owners' ideas about forests and forest ownership. In this study, we examine how private forest owners adhere to different discourses of forests when producing meanings for forests and forest ownership. We especially concentrate on forest owners’ objectives as a part of these discourses. Our discourse analysis combines qualitative (content analysis) and quantitative (NMS ordination) methods and is based on in-depth interviews with 24 Finnish forest owners.We identified the discourse types of 1) the forester, 2) the economist, 3) the distant economist, 4) the critical anti-economist and 5) the dutiful forest owner in the analysis. The first main gradient separating the discourse types illustrated variation from uncertainty (distant economist, dutiful forest owner) to self-confidence in forest management (forester). The second main gradient ran from pure economic emphasis and non-criticalness (economist, distant economist) to an emphasis on non-monetary meanings and a critique of overriding economic orientation (critical anti-economist).Our findings support the view that the position in relation to the economic utilization of the forest is an essential dividing factor among forest owners. More importantly, our discourse analysis revealed some important aspects of forest owners' objectives: 1) forest owners’ general appreciations are often interpreted as actual objectives, resulting in an overly multi-objective impression of forest owners; and 2) careful consideration is always needed before emphasizing the complementarity of economic and non-monetary objectives. For some forest owners, a conflict between these two exists as long as economic objectives equal wood production.In conclusion, meanings for forests and forest ownership are produced and reproduced whenever we speak or write about forests. Policy-makers, scientists, planners and counsellors especially should be more aware of the ideological discourses as a part of their argumentation if we aim to guarantee pleasant and fulfilling forest ownership for every forest owner.