Lucas N. López, Hanne K. Sjølie, Abbas Nabhani, Francisco X. Aguilar. (2024). Impacts of biodiversity and carbon policies on the management of Norwegian forest and its ecosystem services. Silva Fennica vol. 58 no. 4 article id 23067. https://doi.org/10.14214/sf.23067

Keywords: simulation; optimization; site productivity; bio-economic modeling; NorFor; regional impacts; TreeSim

Highlights: National-level biodiversity and carbon forest sector policies modelled in a simulation-optimization framework; Impacts of policies on management along site productivity gradients estimated; Policies vary in impact across productivity gradients with regional implications.

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Measures to enhance boreal forests’ biodiversity and climate change mitigation potential are high on the policy agenda. Site productivity influences management, ecological attributes, and economic outcomes. However, national-level analyses of management implementation in response to policies considering site productivity are lacking. We analyzed impacts of a carbon policy (Carb), a biodiversity policy (Bio) and a combined biodiversity and carbon policy (BioCarb) in Norway using a simulation-optimization framework, assessing impacts on forest management, timber harvest, ecological attributes, and carbon fluxes until year 2140. Management alternatives were simulated in the single-tree simulator TreeSim before being fed into a market model NorFor to compare policy outcomes to a business-as-usual (BAU) scenario. All policies led to decreased harvests. Old forests expanded from the current 3% to cover 21% or more of the productive forest area in all scenarios. Impacts of policies depended on site productivity. On low-productive land, management under Bio mirrored BAU, while the Carb and BioCarb policies yielded more set-asides. On high-productive land, management intensity under the Carb policy was similar to BAU but the Bio and BioCarb policies resulted in more set-asides and more old forest. Thus, on low-productive land, the carbon policy showed to have the strongest impact on forest management, while on high-productive land, the biodiversity policy had the strongest impact. With geographical site-productivity gradients, the two policies exhibited different regional effects. The study shows that ex-ante analyses with appropriate tools can provide relevant information of multiple consequences beyond the stated aims which should be considered in policy design.

López, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Faculty of Applied Ecology, Agricultural Sciences and Biotechnology, P.O. Box 2400, Koppang, Norway https://orcid.org/0009-0006-6860-3408 E-mail: lucas.lopez@inn.no
Sjølie, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Faculty of Applied Ecology, Agricultural Sciences and Biotechnology, P.O. Box 2400, Koppang, Norway https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8099-3521 E-mail: hanne.sjolie@inn.no
Nabhani, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Faculty of Applied Ecology, Agricultural Sciences and Biotechnology, P.O. Box 2400, Koppang, Norway E-mail: abbas.nabhani@inn.no
Aguilar, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Department of Forest Economics, SE-901 83 Umeå, Sweden E-mail: francisco.aguilar@slu.se

Category : Research article

article id 668, category Research article

Hannu Hökkä, Timo Penttilä. (1999). Modelling the dynamics of wood productivity on drained peatland sites in Finland. Silva Fennica vol. 33 no. 1 article id 668. https://doi.org/10.14214/sf.668

Keywords: forest drainage; stand development; autoregressive process; site productivity; structural equation models

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The dynamics of wood productivity on drained peatland sites was analyzed from the covariance structure generated by stand yield data of repeatedly measured permanent sample plots in 81 Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) or Norway spruce (Picea abies Karst. (L.)) stands with admixtures of birch (Betula pubescens Ehrh.). The site production potential, considered a latent variable, was assumed to follow an autoregressive process over time elapsed since drainage. As a measure of the latent variable, a relative growth rate (RGR) index was determined for all stands at the time of drainage and at four successive measurement time points following drainage (on average 16, 23, 30, and 41 years). The index was calculated as the site index of an upland conifer stand with the ratio of periodic volume growth and standing volume and adjusted by changes in stand stocking and thinning. The observed covariance structure was described by fitting a structural equation model to the data of RGR indices. When only the post-drainage measurement times were included, a quasi-simplex model with equal error variances and equal structural parameters at different measurement times fit the data well indicating a permanent covariance structure among the different measurements. Including the measurement at the time of drainage resulted in a non-permanent structure. The stand parameters at the time of drainage were poorly correlated with post-drainage growth. A considerable increase in the wood productivity of the sites was observed, being greatest during twenty years after drainage and continuing up to 40 years since drainage. This was concluded to be due to changes in site properties rather than stand structure although the effects of the single factors could not be analytically separated from one another. Our modelling approach appeared to improve long-term site productivity estimates based merely on botanical site indices.

Hökkä, Finnish Forest Research Institute, Rovaniemi Research Station, PO Box 16, 96301 Rovaniemi, Finland E-mail: hannu.hokka@metla.fi
Penttilä, Finnish Forest Research Institute, Rovaniemi Research Station, PO Box 16, 96301 Rovaniemi, Finland E-mail: tp@nn.fi

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