Economic Availability of Forest Resources in Russia: An Analytical Assessment

The topic of the availability of forest resources is especially relevant for Russia, given the volume of the existing potential of these resources, distributed over a huge area of the country. The purpose of the article is to substantiate the possibilities of using the economic availability of forest resources in the practice of forestry in the Russian Federation. The article presents an analysis of the application of tools based on the economic availability of forest resources. It presents the classification of the forms of forest resources availability and analysis of possible situations that may occur assessing the economic availability of forest resources. The authors analyzed various methods of assessing the economic availability of forest wood resources, formed a criterion of economic availability and considered various conditions of economic availability. The results of calculations of economic availability assessments for the Vilegodskoe forestry located in the southeastern part of the Arkhangelsk region, according to which 19.1% of the analyzed plots were recognized as economically unavailable, are presented. The analysis of the characteristics of economically unavailable forest wood resources in the studied object has been carried out. Proposals have been developed on the spheres of the possible use of the toolkit for the economic availability of forest wood resources. The economic availability of forest resources can be widely used in the forestry practice of the Russian Federation in the areas of pricing and forest exploitation optimization. Its application will increase the level of payments for forest resources, due to the withdrawal of excess profits of loggers, and will also ensure the formation of more realistic forest plans.

Inflation of wood resources in European forests: The footprints of a big-bang

The current increase in European forest resources forms a singularity across the globe. Whether this trend will persist, and how biological and economic trends feature it form crucial issues to green economy challenges and C sequestration. The present screening of Forest Europe 2015 statistics explored the features, inertia and limits of this expansion, and its relationships with countries’ development, forest management and trade, intense in this area of the world. Persisting footprint of past demographic pressure on forests was identified, with opposed traces on their area and growing stock density. Steady growing stock (GS) increases, proportional to GS, not density-limited, and sustained by forest area increases, supported the view of an inflationary forest dynamic. Economic development and liberalism fostered both forest exploitation and production, yielding no significant impact on GS changes. Wood exports exerted a tension on forest exploitation and GS changes, thus lowering GS inflation but providing a resource security margin in the face of expected climate threats. Conflicting a common view, GS inflation and moderate felling-to-increment ratios make increased use of wood resources and C sequestration reconcilable, and GS expansion timely for ongoing EU forest policy processes. Anticipated adverse impacts of ongoing climate change were not clearly identified in these statistics.

Community Use and Product Valuation of Forest Resources in Maasai Mau

Forests play an important role in the livelihoods of local people in most developing countries. Local communities depend on forest resources for various products such as fuel wood, construction materials, medicine, and food. The Maasai Mau forest plays an important role in supporting the livelihood of people living around the forest. Exploitation of forest resources should only be limited to active members. To reduce dependency on the forest, alternative means of livelihood should be provided to reduce dependency on the forest.

Challenges of assessment and mapping of ecosystem services in Bulgarian (Rhodope) and Russian (Altai) mountain protected areas in the context of post-socialist transformations and new conservation paradigms

The overarching goal of this survey was to identify the challenges of ecosystem services assessment and mapping in Russian and Bulgarian mountain protected areas in the context of post-socialist transformations, new conservation paradigms and climate change. The Altai Mountains in Russia and the Rhodope Mountains in Bulgaria were selected as key mountain territories for comparison due to their similar characteristics: agriculture, forest exploitation, tourism activities, etc. Both in Bulgaria and in Russia, perceptions of the protected areas functioning have been changing, facilitated by global shifts. Thus, the concept of ecosystem services has now been actively introduced in nature and biodiversity conservation policies. Based on WDPA data the emergence of different types of protected areas in Russia and Bulgaria was determined. Key problems of assessment and mapping of ecosystem services in Russian and Bulgarian mountain protected areas were recognised, mainly related to the shortage and quality of baseline data. At the same time, there were also some specifics for the two countries due to their size and national legislation. Like many other mountainous regions in the world, the Rhodopes in Bulgaria and the Altai Mountains in Russia are flagships in the improvement of nature conservation strategies. These regions often participate in a variety of international conservation programmes and are constantly expanding the range of protected areas. It is generally accepted that the Altai Mountains and the Rhodopes are not only centres of biodiversity richness in their countries, but also hotspots of a variety of ecosystem services.

Identification of tree species from the Peruvian tropical amazon “Selva Central” forests according to wood anatomy

The “Selva Central” of Peru is characterized by its forest species richness that produces quality wood for countless uses. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the wood and its macroscopic anatomy, which is an important tool for the botanical identification of tree species. For this purpose, 13 sawmills located in 3 provinces were selected that exploit several tree species of “Selva Central”. Sampling of representative woods was carried out, identified by common names and, in the laboratory, they were polished, examined, and grouped by the similarity of the macroscopic anatomical structure, leading to the tree species identification. Twenty tree species were identified, belonging to 17 genera, with emphasis on the Lauraceae and Fabaceae families. However, Moraceae, Meliaceae, Lecythidaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Bignoniaceae, Myristicaceae, Combretaceae, and Burseraceae families were also identified. The anatomical structures of all the identified tree species were described, transversal and longitudinal tangential cross section images were collected, and a species identification key was constructed. The implications and importance of tree species identification via wood anatomy were discussed, in terms of controlling forest exploitation, traceability of the production chain, and the future development of an artificial intelligence tree-species identification method.

Socio-Economic and Legal Analysis on Forest Protection

The protection of forests today is not just a problem is regional (national) but it is a world problem (global). This is related to the function of forests in maintaining ecological balance which also affects the global climate, such as the effect of 'global warming' which can threaten the safety of living things. Nevertheless, reality shows that the economic function of the forest, ie as a source of the eye livelihood for a group of people, as a means of accumulation capital (capital) for entrepreneurs (capitalist), and as a source of foreign exchange for countries, often defeating forest functions in maintaining equilibrium ecological (including global climate). The continued pressure of population increased is one of the factors that contribute to accelerating forest destruction. This is due to the need for more land and more building materials, both for settlement and land for activities farming, and materials for new buildings. Utilization excessive forest economic functions by a human (forest exploitation) without caring about ecological balance can be catastrophic for humans themselves, and require far-reaching economic and social costs greater than the economic results that have been obtained.

Technologies of Intermediate Felling in Difficult to Access Areas

The development of technologies and equipment that meet modern requirements of forest preservation and a gentle mode of forest exploitation becomes a relevant issue within the framework of the implementation of the sustainable forest management principles both at forestry enterprises and in the organization of forestry. Such technologies include developed and field-tested experimental methods of logging using balloon-rope systems for various types and methods of felling. Of particular interest is the concept of using this equipment based on the purpose logging and the environmental and forestry requirements for their implementation. The paper has informative and cognitive nature; its purpose is to provide professionals with information on new technologies and designs of specialized equipment to ensure a gentle mode of forest management and forest exploitation. The article presents the results of theoretical research on possible directions of use of balloon-rope systems when working on forest sites of specially protected natural areas. The authors propose the designs of specialized equipment for the vertical removal of trees (whips) in the process of intermediate felling on the areas with signs of hard access and ecological dependence. Such mechanisms will significantly reduce energy costs when removing branches and limbs from a standing tree and its vertical removal from the plantation. The developed designs of specialized mechanisms for skidding a vertically standing tree without its landing in the form of a grabbing, grabbingcutting and knot-cutting device with a grabber ensure the maximum possible preservation of the forest environment, since they do not cause damage to the nearby stand, the undergrowth or the soil.

Detection of AtRKD4 Protein During Induction of Somatic Embryogenesis in Dendrobium lineale Rolfe Transgenic Orchids Carrying 35S::GR::AtRKD4

Dendrobium lineale is an Indonesian native orchid from the Spatulata section in Orchidaceae Family. This orchid is important because it is usually used as a parental plant in orchid breeding and is predicted to have a potential phytochemistry compound. In addition, in their natural habitat, this orchid is threatened due to forest exploitation and natural disaster. Therefore the precision mass propagation techniques for this orchid need to be conducted. Biotechnological approaches through inserting embryo gene such as AtRKD4 from Arabidopsis thaliana has already been successfully conducted. This study aims to check the integration stability of T-DNA harboring 35S::GR::AtRKD4 from ten selection transformants and to detect the existence of AtRKD4 protein after induction by Dexamethasone and/ Thidiazuron. The result showed that T-DNA were stably integrated into the genome of D. lineale transformants and the AtRKD4 protein with a molecular weight of 28.53 kDa was detected in D. lineale transformant plants after being induced by 15 µM DEX and 3 mgL-1 TDZ for 5 days.

Influence of Climate Variables on the Leaf Morphology of Ebony (Diospyros celebica) and Their Classification Using the Random Forest Algorithm

Background: Climate plays an important role in the growth process of various plant species, and the ebony species is no exception to this. Ebony (Diospyros celebica Bakh.) is a Sulawesi endemic flora species whose wood is widely used as a material for light to heavy construction and important raw material for Indonesia’s timber industry. Massive forest exploitation threatens preservation of the Diospyros celebica, so conservation is needed to save it from extinction. However, the difficulty in distinguishing Diospyros celebica in the tillering phase caused many seed collection errors, so a system was needed to identify plants correctly. This study aims to extract leaf morphological features, analyze the correlation between leaf morphological features and climate variables, and classify them based on the region where Diospyros celebica grows. Result: The results show that several leaf morphological characteristics were sufficiently correlated with climate variables such as MAT and MAP. In dry weather, the leaves of Diospyros celebica tend to have relatively small leaf sizes, whereas, in wetter weather, the leaves tend to have a much larger size. The classification results could distinguish leaf morphology based on growing regions with an accuracy rate of 94.59%. Conclusions: By obtaining a high level of classification accuracy, it can be interpreted that the size of the leaf morphology of the same species (Diospyros celebica) is different in each region, influenced by climate variables, in this case MAT and MAP.