By Louisa Bouri -Saouter and Gesche Schifferdecker When tourists come to visit Germany’s most populous state, North Rhine-Westphalia, some wonder what has happened. Around the Lömecke Tower,…
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How can genuine dialogue about forests succeed?
This question stood at the beginning of our project and became the starting point for our new guide “Forest Dialogues”, developed at the European Forest Institute (EFI) together with colleagues from the Forest Research Institute Baden-Württemberg (FVA).
The debate about the future of our forests is no longer purely technical. Climate change, nature conservation, timber production, and recreation – all play a part in forest management in Germany. Yet both citizens and forestry professionals often feel that their concerns are not fully understood. Foresters, as representatives of forest management, are also mediators between their profession and a society that increasingly demands participation and wants its views to be heard.
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Tick-tock. With every minute that passes, roughly ten football (soccer) fields of irreplaceable tropical primary forest vanish from our planet. Deforestation and forest degradation in…
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Imagine a world where money would do only good. Imagine a world where investors and companies would consider sustainability aspects in all their decisions. Imagine…
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Human: A Barrier to Transformative Change
For biodiversity conservation to be effective, nature must be placed at the heart of decision-making. In recent years, concepts like nature-based solutions (NbS) have emerged as promising tools for fostering social empowerment and ecological transformation. Yet, studies reveal a significant limitation: these concepts are often applied within narrow, specific contexts, restricting their potential to drive transformative change. A troubling pattern emerges when we look closer at how “nature” is framed. Complex, top-down power dynamics often exclude marginalised communities and species from meaningful participation. This disconnect underscores the need to rethink how we approach biodiversity conservation.
The challenges we face in creating a sustainable society are not just environmental — they’re deeply human. We often struggle to align on shared goals to protect the planet. Different languages, perspectives, and priorities can create barriers to collaboration. To develop solutions that effectively address biodiversity loss, we must first overcome the human problems that stand in the way. This calls for a shift toward designing communications and public engagement strategies with a human-centred approach.
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Close-to-nature management as a key to more resilient and multifunctional forests
Jonathan Spazzi, Teagasc Forestry Development Department
“I want our forest to produce quality timber and give us personal satisfaction, while leaving a special biodiversity legacy for our children. That is why I have chosen a close-to-nature management approach,” says Liam Bresnan.
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How can we maximise the carbon stocks and carbon sequestration potential of forests – by managing or not managing them? And how can carbon Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) be made effective and affordable as part of the proposed EU Carbon Removal Certification Framework regulation?
Sofie Van Winckel and Arne Van Wolputte, researchers at KU Leuven, are on a journey to answer these questions using various high-tech tools, including the Arboreal App, an iPad with LIDAR and a computer model based on satellite and field data. Read on and join them in uncovering the secrets of climate mitigation in the INFORMA project’s case studies!
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By Sven Wunder, Douglas Sheil & Robert Nasi
Diverging forecasts and climate science
A Danish proverb says: “It’s hard to make predictions, especially about the future”. More so in a world that seems more uncertain than ever, and where we cannot always rely on the past to infer changes into the future. But how do we societally deal with the inevitable diversity of views about the world’s future? Are we making the best of available intellectual capital to benefit humanity? Or are we, in the name of popular convenience, underutilizing the power of critical reflection and innovative contrarian ideas? Do we need more alternative perspectives to challenge negligent mainstream thinking? These are fundamental questions in addressing major societal crises from global economic imbalances to biodiversity loss, climate change and the approaching tipping points in planetary-wide mechanisms.
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This is a contribution from guest authors: Alexia Fridén1, Dalia D’Amato2,3, Hanna Ekström1, Bogomil Iliev4, Akonwi Nebsifu2, Wilhelm May1,Marianne Thomsen4, Nils Droste1.
1 Lund University, Sweden, 2 University of Helsinki, Finland, 3 Finnish Environment Institute, Finland, 4 Copenhagen University, Denmark
Forest ecosystems play a crucial role in providing economic, ecological, and social values, both nationally and internationally. This significance is particularly evident in the forest-rich countries of the Nordics such as Sweden and Finland, where a long history of forest policies unfolds, intertwined with national (and more recently, international) macro-trends such as war, economic boom, and globalization.
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Anyone who works as a researcher with an environmental or forestry organisation like EFI will tell you that there’s no such thing as a “proper” holiday; indeed, sitting on the beach for 2 weeks sounds to me like the very epitome of sensory deprivation (and that’s even despite having a dodgy knee). By contrast, the idea of a road trip around British Columbia (BC) with my family this summer sounded like a veritable voyage of discovery. So, it was with enthusiasm (and a degree of trepidation) that we boarded a flight from Frankfurt bound for Vancouver with the aim of exploring parts of the Pacific NW in a campervan. Without a doubt, BC’s diverse forests would certainly influence a large part in our travel itinerary; both in positive and negative ways, as it turned out. There was much to learn on our journey.
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