Framework for Achieving Sustainable Forest Management
"Sustainable forest management" implies that forest resources will be managed to supply goods and services to meet the current demands of society while conserving and renewing the availability, capacity, and quality of the resource, at least at some scale, if not on every site, for future generations. Internationally agreed definitions of sustainability involve social, environmental, and economic values. Different values are given variable weighting when applied to management planning at scales ranging from stands to ecoregions depending on the site characteristics, stakeholder interests, and local values. Sustaining the environmental values of forest resources requires consideration of such ecosystem attributes as vegetation, soils, water, biodiversity, the productive capacity of soils and forested regions, and forest health.
Each of the topics discussed in this section of the encyclopedia is considered part of the overall framework essential to achieve the intent of sustainable forest management. For example, Adaptive Forest Management provides a management planning framework within which forest managers can set environmental goals for their operations, monitor performance, and continually improve. International agreements and protocols have provided the voluntary policy framework for defining sustainable forest management and have contributed to the establishment of performance standards and criteria and indicators by which performance can be, and is, measured at national and local scales of resolution. Certification systems complete the framework necessary to achieve sustainable forest management by providing mechanisms for third pary audit of forest management systems, performance standards, and operational success. Each of these components of the overall framework is described in more detail in the following sections:
Encyclopedia ID: p1267
