Setting Up Optimal Meteorological Networks: An Example From Italy

A permanent assessment of climate regime in forest sites has a key role in forest resource conservation and preservation of ecosystem services, biodiversity and landscape multi-functionality, informing sustainable forest management. In this view, time-series of meteorological data relative to several monitoring sites from the ICP-Forest network in Italy, were analyzed with the aim to define the number of site-specific observations, which can be considered adequate for further analysis on forest resource management. The relative importance of each factor accounted in our analysis (season, year, variable, plot, sampling proportion) was investigated comparing results through the use of descriptive statistics.

Aesthetic resources of the central ecological zone of the Baikal natural territory (within the borders of the Irkutsk region)

The research considers the results of the aesthetic assessment of landscapes in the central ecological zone of the Baikal natural territory (CEZ BNT). The expert assessment based on a set of indicators was carried out in Quantum GIS using landscape photographs. Cartographic materials (landscape typological map, Forest Resource Management maps, SRTM, areas affected by fire, etc.) were also involved in the assessment. The map «Aesthetic Evaluation of the Geosystems of the Central Ecological zone of Lake Baikal within the Borders of the Irkutsk Region» was created based on the analysis of the estimated indicators of the aesthetic landscape quality. The construction of the map is based on the principle of the priority of landscape scene viewpoints; the assessment is assigned to the polygon from which the landscape scene is observed. The article contains the detailed structure of the landscape scene complexes of the CEZ BNT.

A New Individual Tree Species Classification Method Based on the ResU-Net Model

Individual tree species (ITS) classification is one of the key issues in forest resource management. Compared with traditional classification methods, deep learning networks may yield ITS classification results with higher accuracy. In this research, the U-Net and ResNet networks were combined to form a Res-UNet network by changing the structure of the convolutional layer to the residual structure in ResNet based on the framework of the U-Net model. In addition, a second Res-UNet network named Res-UNet2 was further constructed to explore the effect of the stacking of residual structures on network performance. The Res-UNet2 model structure is similar to that of the Res-UNet model, but the convolutional layer in the U-Net model is created with a double-layer residual structure. The two networks proposed in this work were used to classify ITSs in WorldView-3 images of the Huangshan Mountains, Anhui Province, China, acquired in March 2019. The resulting ITS map was compared with the classification results obtained with U-Net and ResNet. The total classification accuracy of the ResU-Net network reached 94.29% and was higher than that generated by the U-Net and ResNet models, verifying that the ResU-Net model can more accurately classify ITSs. The Res-UNet2 model performed poorly compared to Res-UNet, indicating that stacking the residual modules in ResNet does not achieve an accuracy improvement.

Forest Resource Management: An Empirical Study in Northern Pakistan

Community participation for forest sustainability and use of forest resources for community development is considered a vital way in all societies. This study was conducted to assess the public views toward sustainable forest management in the area of Gilgit–Baltistan, Pakistan, through collecting data from 255 respondents. Views about forest management techniques at different levels were discussed. Three main areas of focus to manage forest resources were: strategic-level management, local-level management, and communication-level management. To provide confidence and to measure factors affecting sustainable forest management, this study applied the structural equation modeling approach and built a model that explained and identified the critical factors affecting sustainable forest management. A quantitative approach via Smart Partial Least Squares version 3.2.8 was used for analysis. The findings of the study show that the R2 value of the model was 0.653, which means that the three exogenous latent constructs collectively explained 65.3% of the variance in sustainable forest management. In this study, the goodness of fit of the model was 0.431, which is considered valid for further analysis. Among the three proposed levels for forest management, the strategic-level-management factor was found the most important of the three variables. This study concluded that for better and sustainable forest management, policies should flow from the strategic level to the local and also focus on communication-level management because all these factors appear to be significant in measuring sustainable forest management. Community engagement and awareness are also found to be an important way for forest resource management.

Community perspectives on conservation of water sources in Tarkeshwar sacred groves, Himalaya, India

Sacred groves have significance in socio-culture and biodiversity conservation. This study evaluated local people perceptions regarding conservation of sacred groves for water-services, through willingness-to-pay (WTP), willingness-to-accept (WTA) and willingness-to-labour-work (DLP). Data were collected through a pre-tested questionnaire from 107 randomly selected households in 18 villages of Uttarakhand. The villages were categorised into 3 classes (core, nearby, faraway) based on proximity to the forests. The contingent-valuation method was used to evaluate WTP [Rs 3,802 (≈$57)] and WTA [Rs 38,224 (≈$571)] for water as an ecosystem-service and statistical-analyses were performed to evaluate whether factors such as gender, age, household-income and location explained differences in the parameters. It was found that gender had a significant impact on WTP, with women having higher WTP, and that location had significant impact on WTA. The result shows that WTA increased with increasing distance from the sacred-groves (Rs 43,077 ± 21,139 in faraway-villages and Rs 35,323 ± 10,483 in core-villages). The results indicated that consideration of gender inequality and education status in villages should be included in planning and decision making about participatory forest management of sacred-groves. These findings facilitate forest-resource-management in mountains and provide guidance for programmes and policies dealing with irrigation, drinking-water and community development.

Effect of Land Property Rights on Forest Resources in Southern China

The land tenure reform is important for forest resource management worldwide. Since China initiated a new round of collective forestland tenure reform (CFTR) in 2003, improving forest output by clarifying property rights plays a crucial role in realizing sustainable forest resource management. Using survey data of 312 bamboo plantation households from Southern China, this paper empirically examines the impact path of land property rights on forest resources. The estimation results show that both the forestland use right and disposal right are able to significantly improve the forest output by encouraging households to invest and optimizing the allocation of forestry labor. Particularly, the results reveal that the use right has a positive impact on forest output through forestland investment. With regard to the disposal right, we find that it has a positive effect on forest output through forestland investment, but it has a negative impact on forest output through the forestry labor allocation. The findings of this study suggest that to promote the growth of forest resources, the government should endow households with a more complete set of rights, and further strengthen their understanding of property rights. In addition, our findings enhance the understanding of the collective forestland tenure reform in China; they also have implications for the decentralized management of forestry elsewhere in the world.

Policy Model Reconstruction of Social Forestry

Internationally, there has been a paradigm shift in forest resource management from state-based forest management to community-based forest management. This change has also occurred in Indonesia, namely through the social forestry program as outlined in the the Minister Regulation on Social Forestry and the Minister Regulation on Social Forestry in Perhutani Area. Indeed, these Ministerial Regulations already contain the principles of community-based forest management. However, the implementation still leaves problems. This paper will analyze the procedural weaknesses and inaccuracies in the designation of these Ministerial Regulations. The approach used is the statutory approach and comparison with qualitative analysis. The result shows that it is necessary to change the policy model by changing procedures by re-functioning the role of Forest Management Units as an institution that has the authority to manage forest resources in its area. Besides, the Social Forestry program should only be intended for forest communities who have pioneered forest resource management, whether they have joined the Community Joint Forest Management program or not. However, they must reside around forests managed by Perum Perhutani.