Forest resilience project gets the green light
Forests provide Europe’s societies with a broad range of essential ecosystem services. They are the source of one of Europe’s most valuable renewable resources – wood. At the same time, they are a decisive base for biodiversity, provide crucial protective functions for societies, and are a critically important green infrastructure for recreation and climate regulation, also in urban areas. Yet, forests are subject to distinct disturbance patterns, ranging from small scale local events, such as a local summer storm, to events at transnational scales, such as major pest outbreaks and forest fires.
Matthias Schwoerer from BMEL and Marc Palahí from EFI signed the agreement for a new project focusing on sustaining and enhancing resilience.
This week, a new project focussing on the resilience of European forest was given the go ahead. The SURE project (SUstaining and Enhancing REsilience of European Forests) is a three-year project which aims to enhance the resilience of European forest socio-ecological landscapes, including both forest ecosystems and the people managing them and depending on their ecosystem services. It will provide intelligence across the three spheres of science, policy and practice to enhance forest resilience and address disturbance-related risks as an integral part of sustainable forest management.
The 700,000 euro project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL), and will be coordinated by the EFI Bonn Office.
For more information, contact Dr Georg Winkel, Head of Resilience Programme, EFI, georg.winkel@efi.int
