4.04.04 - Sustainable forest management scheduling
Unit 4.04.04
UNIT NOTICEBOARD
Special issue of Forests: Call for Manuscript Submissions
Special Issue "Non-Wood Forest Products Management: Inventory, Planning, Governance, Marketing and Trade"
Forest ecosystems provide various benefits to society in the form of ecosystem services. Non-wood forest products or wild products (NWFPs) (forest fruits, mushrooms, cork, pine kernels, acorns, medicinal herbs, essential oils, chestnuts, etc.) are cross-categorical ecosystem services that have recently received substantial attention from researchers and practitioners. They have been used in pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and food, in local medicines, and in other products supporting health and livelihoods. Many research works have been devoted to the study of various aspects of NWFPs, mainly to contribute to the creation of jobs, socio-economic opportunities, and the competitiveness of rural economies, while mitigating climate change effects, addressing soil conservation concerns, and providing effective responses to address the need for carbon-neutral energy. There are a myriad of opportunities to unlock the full potential of NWFPs, such as creating new knowledge and tools to optimize the sustainable provision and profitability of NWFPs, fostering the development of market conditions for NWFPs, and developing economic and governance strategies for the better management of wild forest products—particularly in low-income countries. Thus, we encourage research endeavors involving the development of models, methods, processes, and decision support tools to address the inventory, planning, harvesting, governance, certification, marketing, and trade of NWFPs to contribute to this Special Issue. This initiative will also contribute to the NWFP knowledge base and to the strengthening of research strategies to support the full encapsulation of NWFPs in the framework of the sustainable management of forest ecosystems. This Special Issue is developed in collaboration with the 19th Symposium on Systems Analysis in Forest Resources (SSAFR 2021), and it is sponsored by the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO Units 4.04.04—Sustainable Forest Management Scheduling and 5.11-Non-Wood Forest Products as well as the IUFRO Task Force on Unlocking the Bioeconomy and Non-Timber Forest Products). Papers submitted for publication in this Special Issue will undergo a rigorous peer-review process with the aim of prompt and wide dissemination of research results and applications.
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2022.
More information at: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/forests/special_issues/nonwood_forest_products
Jose G. Borges, Portugal
About Unit
Unit 4.04.04 focuses on the development and application of new methods and tools for efficiently and effectively managing forests. An objective of this unit is to facilitate interaction, dissemination and exchange of new models, methods and technological innovations to address sustainable forest management scheduling through workshops, conferences, and publications.
State of Knowledge
Forests serve a multitude of functions and addressing so many different goals to satisfy the needs of forest owners, the forest industry, and society poses a considerable challenge for forest managers. Sustainable forest ecosystem management scheduling involves complex decision-making processes that cannot be addressed by empirical methods only, but requires advanced decision-support tools. Research and development in the past 30 years have enabled substantial changes in the practice of forest management. There is a wide experience of developing and applying management science approaches and computerized decision-support tools for sustainable forest management.
Key to further innovation and success of sustainable forest management scheduling is the development and dissemination of research that may target hot topics such as a) the architecture and implementation of decision support systems (DSS), b) the models and methods to support decision-making in DSS, c) the knowledge management techniques in DSS and d) the participatory processes to be supported by DSS.
This will be influential to innovation in several processes within sustainable forest management scheduling namely: (1) operational, tactical and strategic forest management decision analysis, (2) assessment and analysis of forestry projects, (3) economic and environmental impact assessment of forestry projects and programs, (4) decision analysis as a forest policy tool, (5) participatory forest resources decision making and collaborative planning, (6) methodologies for regional and national forestland use planning and (7) the development of both undergraduate and graduate level forest resources management and economics courses.