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The establishment and sustainable management of forests, as well as timber production, become an increasingly important economic, environmental and social factors at a global and national scale. This is reflected in a series of documents both at international and European level and at national level, prepared and entered into force in recent years. More significant and defining for the Republic of Bulgaria are the following: European Green Pact, EU Forest Strategy for 2030 adopted on 16 July this year by the Council of the EU and the European Commission, the EU Biodiversity Strategy adopted in 2020 with a horizon of 2030, the National Strategy for Adaptation to Climate Change for 2030 and the Action Plan to it adopted in 2019, the Strategy for Biological Diversity in the Republic of Bulgaria, which is currently at the stage of coordination in the state authorities of the Republic of Bulgaria and others. These documents give priority to the so-called 'green economy'. The new EU Forest Strategy is in line with the European Green Deal and the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 and recognizes the central role of forests, forest managers and the entire forest-based value chain in achieving a sustainable and climate-friendly economy and in ensuring that all ecosystems are restored, sustainable and adequately protected. The present study analyses the round timber harvest in the country and the export / shipment of unprocessed timber and the respective trends of change for the period 2016 to 2020 are established, and the relevant conclusions are sought and made. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainable forest management in South-East Asia is challenged by smallholder livestock husbandry as farmers supplement insufficient on-farm forage with resources extracted from forests. This study assesses which determinants affect forest resource extraction by investigating teak forest usage by Indonesian cattle farmers. Based on a survey of 600 smallholders, we provide an overview of which resources are extracted, assess the factors influencing the likelihood of becoming a forest user group member and analyse characteristics that differ between members and non-members as well as the effect of membership on extraction frequency. Almost half of the farmers collect animal forage and heating material from teak forests or farm forestland. Two thirds of farmers who extract resources are not institutionally organized. Increasing distance to forests as well as diversity of extraction are found to be related with increased odds for highest extraction frequency. Group members differ from non-members mainly in the number of resources extracted as well as the usage of forest grass as a main forage source. Farmers are more likely to be group members with increasing farm size and poverty levels. Socio-economic benefits obtained from group membership should be redesigned so that more smallholders are motivated to join this governance scheme. If sustainable forest management schemes are scaled up to agroforestry-based agricultural intensification, a broad set of national and international benefits could be realized. • Forage, wood, and forestland are the most frequently used forest resources. • Farmers specialized in cattle keeping are less likely to join forest user groups. • Poor farmers are more likely to be member of forest user groups. • Developing social and economic benefits for smallholders will incentivize group membership. • Incentivizing farmers to specialize on feed production can reduce unsustainable forest extraction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using timber from multifunctional forests for energy production can be economically viable and environmentally friendly when it is consistent with the principles of sustainable management; otherwise, it could be harmful from both an ecological and commercial point of view. The objective of this paper was to present the overall balance of timber biomass from felled trees in multifunctional forests and assess what kind and how much of this biomass can be used for energy purposes. The research material consisted of data on forest resources and the volume of timber removal in Polish State Forests in 2016–2020. The biomass of branches and stumps of felled trees was determined using biomass expansion factors (BEFs). The results obtained in this study indicated that industrial timber, energy wood, and biomass left in the forest as a source of deadwood are 67%, 20%, and 13% of the total woody biomass, respectively. The Polish State Forest's potential for energy wood is estimated at 6.18 million tonnes of biomass annually. Total available energy produced from woody biomass amounted to 104.8 PJ y−1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indigenous people, who are often economically, socially, and culturally dependent on forests, represent important stakeholders in forest management. Due to high costs, indigenous communities partner with external institutions to harvest timber, often resulting in forest degradation within their territories, internal and external conflicts, and disinterest in starting new timber management projects. Using a standardized methodology to investigate the outcomes of previous community forestry projects presents an opportunity to better understand and potentially resolve these issues. Hence, we conducted research in the Sinchi Roca I native community in Peru. Our objectives were (1) to describe the process of timber harvest, (2) to analyze gender differences in local perceptions of timber management, and (3) to evaluate the outcomes of the timber activity, applying socioeconomic criteria and indicators. Data collection included in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and intra-household surveys. We found that locals partnered with a company for timber harvesting, which led to a sanction from the Peruvian government. Timber harvesting was therefore negatively perceived in the community, with 83.75% of survey respondents dissatisfied with the activity and 88.75% reporting internal and external conflicts due to the presence of the company. Moreover, women did not have a major role in timber harvesting, nor did they actively participate in planning meetings. Results suggest that improving future timber management projects in indigenous communities requires that projects be adapted to local realities and encourage local participation, including training for locals in governance, administration of documents, and negotiations with external stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The value of non‐commodity ecosystem services provided by forests is widely recognized, but intensive forest management practices are increasing, with uncertain consequences for a multitude of these services. Quantitative relationships among biodiversity conservation, timber production and other ecosystem services remain poorly understood, especially during the early‐successional period of intensively managed forestlands.We manipulated management intensity in regenerating forest plantations to test the prediction that treatments aimed at maximizing timber production decrease biodiversity conservation and non‐timber services. We measured species richness of 3 taxonomic groups and 13 proxies for provisioning, cultural and regulating services within stands randomly assigned to one of the three herbicide application intensities or an untreated control.Herbicides increased allocation of net primary production to crop trees, increasing projected timber volume and revenues at 40‐ and 60‐year harvest ages. Commonly used herbicide prescriptions reduced culturally valued plants by 71%, wild‐ungulate forage by 41%, avian richness by 20% and pollinator floral resources by 42%, the latter being associated with 38% fewer pollinator species. However, agriculturally valued bumblebees, pollination of blueberries, avian‐mediated arthropod control, wild ungulate observations and regulation services tied to forest productivity appeared unaffected by increasing management intensity and timber production.Species richness and flora‐provided services in young forest plantations exhibited strong trade‐offs with projected timber production, whereas post‐treatment vegetation regeneration and site‐level variation likely maintained a range of other services. Although vegetation recovery is important for supporting wildlife and some ecosystem services on industrial forestlands, it is unlikely that any single prescription can optimize both timber and non‐timber benefits to society across managed forest landscapes. Instead, producing different services in discrete portions of the landscape may be necessary.Synthesis and applications. We tested the effects of intensive forest management via herbicides on ecosystem services and found that biodiversity responses and services from early‐successional vegetation trade‐off against timber production. A number of services appeared to be compatible with timber production, although no single prescription optimized the full range of services. Stand‐level biodiversity conservation and a variety of services could potentially be provided by treatment skips and less‐intensive management on productive sites, although it is unlikely that all services can be optimized without landscape‐level planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although A. angustifolia is currently economically unimportant, the worldwide trend of conservation through the sustainable use of natural resources together with recent results of genetic breeding are delivering promising perspectives for a new wave of plantations. This study aimed to determine optimal pruning intensity by evaluating the diameter and height growth of A. angustifolia trees. Pruning quality in terms of occlusion and defect-core size were also investigated. At the age of 6 years, the pruning experiment was started by conducting six different pruning intensities, named after the number of whorls left after pruning (0, 2, 4, 6, and 8), as well as unpruned (U) trees as a control. From the results obtained in the present study, it was concluded that pruning intensity had a significant effect on the growth of young A. angustifolia trees. Diameter was more affected than height growth. Pruning A. angustifolia trees for knotty-free timber production must be conducted keeping 8 whorls after the intervention if no negative effect in current annual increment in diameter is to be observed. A defect core of 15 cm seems to be a feasible target for the species regarding optimal pruning intensity to avoid losses in diameter growth. This is strongly dependent on a fast occlusion process, which, in turn, is a result of a careful pruning technique. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study provides a regional model framework to evaluate timber supply and carbon impacts of environmental and socioeconomic change in Maine, USA. We construct alternative future narratives that vary economic growth, forest management, and environmental policies and then conduct econometric analysis to project forest area and timber supply over the next 80 years under five shared socioeconomic pathways (SSPs). Forest area changes from 2020-2100 ranged from a 11% decline in SSP3 (regional rivalry) to 0.2% for SSP1 (sustainability). Maine's forest carbon stocks and timber supply can still mutually increase before 2070 for all pathways, largely due to improvements in forest management, growth, and yield. Overall timber supply is projected to increase by 0.21-0.51% per annum, with supply expanding faster for pathways with higher timber price growth. Total forest carbon stocks (ecosystem and products) are projected to increase 0.40-0.64%/yr for similar reasons. Sensitivity analysis indicated the key drivers most likely to affect Maine's forest sector are timber prices, population change, personal income, land value, and conservation land area. This study offers valuable insight on possible methods about region-specific socioeconomic assessments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider the problem of tactical forest management over a 5-year horizon with yearly periods. The main decisions made consider which harvest areas to cut in each period, the flow of timber from an area to each wood-processing mill to satisfy its annual demand, and which roads to build to access a harvest area not connected to the existing road network. The goal is to minimize the total transportation and road-building costs subject to budget limitations. To explore the benefits of economies of scale (EOS) in road construction, we incorporated this notion in the proposed model. Then, the efficiency of the obtained solution is compared with the model without EOS. The proposed model is a mixed-integer linear program, including several timber assortments and multiple periods. We validated the model for a realistic case in the context of the province of Quebec. The results demonstrate that consideration of EOS significantly reduces the total cost by about 5.3%. In the EOS solution, the road segments that are built every year are very concentrated in specific parts of the region, allowing a road-building company to take advantage of EOS. Moreover, this solution provides a much more efficient timber transportation plan. Key words: tactical forest management, integrated model, harvest planning, road building, economies of scale. Nous examinons le probleme de l'amenagement forestier tactique avec des periodes annuelles sur un horizon de 5 ans. Les principales decisions a prendre concernent les zones qui doivent etre coupees a chaque periode, la circulation du bois d'une zone vers chacune des usines de transformation pour satisfaire leur demande annuelle et les chemins a construire pour acceder a une zone de recolte non reliee au reseau existant de chemins. L'objectif consiste a minimiser le cout total du transport et de la construction des chemins qui est soumis a des restrictions budgetaires. Pour explorer les benefices des economies d'echelle (EE) dans la construction des chemins, nous avons incorpore cette notion dans le modele qui est propose. Ensuite, l'efficacite de la solution obtenue est comparee avec le modele sans EE. Le modele qui est propose est un modele de programmation lineaire partiellement en nombres entiers, qui inclut plusieurs assortiments de bois et de multiples periodes. Nous avons valide le modele avec un cas reel dans le contexte de la province de Quebec. Les resultats demontrent que le fait de tenir compte des EE reduit de facon significative le cout total d'environ 5,3%. Dans la solution avec les EE, les segments de chemin qui sont construits a chaque annee sont tres concentres dans des parties specifiques de la region, ce qui permet a l'entreprise qui construit les chemins de tirer profit des EE. De plus, cette solution procure un plan de transport du bois beaucoup plus efficace. [Traduit par la Redaction] Mots-cles : amenagement forestier tactique, modele integre, planification de la recolte, construction de chemins, economies d'echelle., 1. Introduction In Canada, the forest products industry is a major contributor to the country's wealth in addition to its many social and environmental benefits. In the province of Quebec, [...]

Understanding how land‐management intensification shapes the relationships between biodiversity, yield, and economic benefit is critical for managing natural resources. Yet, manipulative experiments that test how herbicides affect these relationships are scarce, particularly in forest ecosystems where considerable time lags exist between harvest revenue and initial investments. We assessed these relationships by combining 7 yr of biodiversity surveys (>800 taxa) and forecasts of timber yield and economic return from a replicated, large‐scale experiment that manipulated herbicide application intensity in operational timber plantations. Herbicides reduced species richness across trophic groups (−18%), but responses by higher‐level trophic groups were more variable (0–38% reduction) than plant responses (−40%). Financial discounting, a conventional economic method to standardize past and future cash flows, strongly modified biodiversity–revenue relationships caused by management intensity. Despite a projected 28% timber yield gain with herbicides, biodiversity–revenue trade‐offs were muted when opportunity costs were high (i.e., economic discount rates ≥7%). Although herbicides can drive biodiversity–yield trade‐offs, under certain conditions, financial discounting provides opportunities to reconcile biodiversity conservation with revenue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Variations in both the behavior of wildlife and the scale at which the environment most influences the space use of wild animals (i.e., scale of effect) are critical, but often overlooked in habitat selection modeling. Ecologists have proposed that biological responses happening over longer time frames are influenced by environmental variables at larger spatial scales, but this has rarely been empirically tested. Here, we hypothesized that long‐term patterns of behavior (i.e., lasting multiple weeks to months) would be associated with larger scales of effect than more sporadic behaviors. We predicted site use by 43 radio‐telemetered timber rattlesnakes (Crotalus horridus) exhibiting four distinct, time‐varying behaviors (foraging, digestion, ecdysis, and gestation) using remotely sensed environmental variables related to forest structure and landscape topography. Among sites used by snakes, warmer temperatures and higher levels of forest disturbance were predictive of behaviors dependent on thermoregulation including gestation and ecdysis while more moderate temperatures and drier, more oak‐dominated sites were predictive of foraging. Long‐term behaviors were associated with larger spatial scales across most variables, supporting our hypothesis that the scale at which habitat selection occurs is linked to the temporal scale of relevant behaviors. Management recommendations based on single‐scale models of habitat use that do not account for fine‐scale variations in behavior may obscure the importance of potentially limiting habitat features needed for infrequent behaviors that are important for growth and reproduction of this and related species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plantation forestry in southern Brazil demands additional timber species to a higher market differentiation by providing high quality timber and exploitation of market niches. Cupressus lusitanica has long been recognized for this purpose but, until now, it was not properly region-wide quantified in terms of growth and yield. The present study delivers the lacking quantitative approach, which may encourage the commercial use of the species. With this study it was aimed at collecting and processing quantitative data from all known C. lusitanica stands in southern Brazil. Inventories were carried out (60 ha, 6-39 years of age) in order to model the development of dominant height (h100), basal area, volume and dominant diameter (d100). Dominant height was the basis for site quality evaluation, delivering site index curves, which, together with the commercial volume of the stands, allowed yield modelling. A wide amplitude of dominant height growth was detected (10-30 m at 20 years), indicating a great site quality variation. At age of 20 years, commercial volumes of 110 and 620 m³ ha-1 were observed for site indexes of 14 and 26, respectively, equivalent to a maximum of 6-31 m³ ha-1 year-1 at ages between 16-18 years. Results demonstrated in a robust manner that C. lusitanica has a high potential for cultivation in southern Brazil. Thus, offering the opportunity of market differentiation by promoting market niches whose demands timber for special solid end-uses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]