Coordinator: Dr. Manfred LEXER
Key issue and tasks
Key issue
The issues will be discussed all through the Working Group meetings. The preliminary list of several key issues could be read below.
Enhancement of stand resistance/resilience and natural adaptation capacity:
- Soil structure, water balance and nutrient cycle;
- Species and species/sites combinations threatened by climate change;
- Risk assessment and management (natural and economic risk);
- Diversity of stands and stand characteristics including species composition, structure and scale considerations;
- Production time (maturity) and spacing regime (thinning schedule);
- Biological and genetic diversity;
- Interactions between adaptation and conservation issues.
Enhancement of new and renewed stands:
- Site analyses and mapping;
- Natural regeneration versus plantation or sowing;
- Identification and conservation of genetic resources (in/ex situ);
- New trials (species, provenances, mixed species) and networking of present trials.
Policy measures, instruments and governance:
- Decision methods under uncertainty, no regret options, decision space between options;
- Identification of robust silvicultural alternatives;
- Management planning at the landscape level;
- Protocols, instruments and indicators for the evaluation of the efficiency of the different measures or recommended practices;
- Education, training and capacity building;
- Communication and information.
Tasks
Year 1: State of knowledge = one report / country
Years 2 & 3: Work on key issues
- Management
- Tree stands replacement
- Policies: Assessment of present policy management measures in order to adapt to climate change (survey among countries).
- Coordination
- Information / communication
Year 4: Guidelines and recommendations for managers and development projects ; identification of needs in the future researches and development projects
And throughout the duration of the action: updating the national reports
List of memberts :
- Lithuania (Lithuanian Forest Research Institute)
- Switzerland (WSL Swiss Federal Institute of Forest, Snow and Landscape Research ; Ernst Basler + Partner, Zurich ; Bern university of applied sciences, forest ecology)
- Belgium (FUSAGx)
- Italy (University of Molise ; University of Tuscia – Dept.of Ecology and Sust. Econ.Devel)
- Bulgaria (University of Forestry – BG)
- Cyprus
- Sweden
- Estonia (Estonian University of Life Sciences)
- EFI (European Forest Institut)
- France (Office National des Forêts)
- Austria (University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences, Vienna; Institute of Silviculture)
- Finland
- Germany (Dresden University of Technology Faculty Forest, Geo and Hydro Sciences)
- Serbia (Institute of Lowland Forestry and Environment)
- Croatia (Forest Research Institute)
- Greece (Department of Forestry, TEI Lamia)
- Germany (Department of Silviculture and Forest Ecology of the Temperate Zones, Georg-August University Göttingen)
- Lithuania (Lithuanian Forest Research Institute)
- Slovak Republic (National Forest Centre – Forest Research Institute in Zvolen)
- Czech Republic (Czech University of Life Sciences, Faculty of Forestry and Wood Sciences, Department of Silviculture)
More about Action COST Echoes : http://www.gip-ecofor.org/cost-echoes-climate-change/