Assessing actual landscapes for the maintenance of forest biodiversity - a pilot study using forest management data

摘要

New values and policies related to the maintenance of biodiversity have led to a landscape perspective in Swedish forest management. As a result, data tor ecological landscape planning have been compiled. The current challenge is to make strategic decisions about the relative efforts for the two main objectives set out in national and company policies for sustainable forest management: wood production and biodiversity being interpreted as the maintenance of viable populations of species. We studied the usefulness of the data in forest management plans within Sveaskog Co. for ranking forest landscapes with respect to the opportunity for succeeding with the biodiversity objective. To identify the position of individual landscapes with respect to the policy gradient from nature conservation to production we used ordination techniques to illustrate four variables affecting the maintenance of biodiversity. These were: 1) differences in the fragmentation of the land ownership affecting the property rights of the physical landscape, 2) site type distribution, 3) the proportion of forest with high conservation value both in the landscape as a whole and 4) in the conservation areas already set aside. The analyses strongly suggest that individual actual landscapes have very different chances of maintaining viable populations of all species, which is the goal of the Swedish forest policy. The ordinations indicate that the landscapes could be grouped into diffet-ent categories, ranging from just a few with good chances of maintaining viable populations of specialised species (EcoParks), to the vast majority ot landscapes having lirtle forest with apparent high conservation value or fragmented ownership. The analyses support the "triad approach" of varying the management ambitions for production and conservation depending on a landscape's chances to maintain biodiversity in the long term. Finally, we discuss the need for improved data collection and active collaboration between scientists and managers to make sustainable forest management operational.