The European Forest Institute

What’s on the policy horizon for forest ecosystem services?

What’s on the policy horizon for forest ecosystem services?

After a tumultuous year of restriction and restraint, can renewed policies in the European Union’s policy framework for forests offer some hope? The new EU Green Deal and the Biodiversity Strategy to 2030 will be complemented in 2021 by the eagerly anticipated EU Forest Strategy. A fitting moment, then, to bring policy makers and practitioners together in the second of the SINCERE Talks series to discuss what this might mean for Europe’s forests and for forest ecosystem services in particular.

sinceremanage 2020-12-17T17:47:37+00:00 December 16th, 2020|Tags: Biodiversity Strategy, forest policy, Green Deal, Integrate Network, news_all, PES, SINCERE Talks, The European Forest Institute, webinar|0 Comments

Towards an EU policy framework for forest ecosystem services – reflecting on 2020, exploring 2021!

Towards an EU policy framework for forest ecosystem services – reflecting on 2020, exploring 2021!

The SINCERE Talks webinar series continues with an insightful debate on the changing policy framework at EU level for forest ecosystem services, organised jointly with the European Network Integrate.

Monday 7 December 2020, 10:00 – 12:00 CET

Inês Martins 2020-12-04T10:52:38+00:00 November 27th, 2020|Tags: EU Policy, Intergrate Network, PES, SINCERE Talks, The European Forest Institute, webinar|0 Comments

SINCERE Talks series kicks off with a focus on forests and water

SINCERE Talks series kicks off with a focus on forests and water

Forests and water are intricately linked. But the relationships between them are complex and are changing with the changing climate. The first SINCERE Talks webinar, held on 25 September 2020, gave participants a fascinating insight into the topic. Renowned experts Meine van Noordwijk (ICRAF) and Sven Wunder (EFI) discussed firstly how forest management affects hydrological services and secondly how payment for environmental services schemes can support such management.

sinceremanage 2020-10-01T12:12:16+00:00 September 30th, 2020|Tags: forests and water, news_all, PES, SINCERE Talks, The European Forest Institute, webinar|0 Comments

SINCERE Talks webinar #1: Forests and water

SINCERE Talks webinar #1: Forests and water

Friday 25 September 2020, 10 – 12 CET

The SINCERE Talks webinar series kicks off with an insightful two-part session on the relationship between forest and landscape management, and watershed protection and hydrological services.

sinceremanage 2020-07-24T11:32:35+00:00 July 24th, 2020|Tags: forests and water, news_all, PES, SINCERE Talks, The European Forest Institute, webinar|0 Comments

Adaptive solutions required to fit forests for cultural and recreational use

Adaptive solutions required to fit forests for cultural and recreational use

Cultural ecosystem services are gaining importance in European forests, but their promotion requires flexible and combined strategies.

Inês Martins 2020-07-24T11:00:42+00:00 July 21st, 2020|Tags: European Landowners' Organization, The European Forest Institute, The University of Göttingen, The University of Kassel|0 Comments

SINCERE PES paper sparks discussion in Nature Sustainability

SINCERE PES paper sparks discussion in Nature Sustainability

An article based on work in SINCERE has led to some interesting published discussion on Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) in the journal Nature Sustainability. The original paper From principles to practice in paying for nature’s services, led to a critical response from Esteve Corbera (UAB) and his collaborators (Wells et al.) who wrote to defend simplified PES designs and called for further consideration of social-ecological context and drivers of environmental interventions and behaviour. EFI Principal Scientist and SINCERE project consortium member, Sven Wunder, led a reply from the original researcher team addressing in turn PES technical design, equity concerns [...]

sinceremanage 2020-06-10T16:16:46+00:00 June 10th, 2020|Tags: PES, The European Forest Institute|0 Comments

Sustainable Development Goals: Their Impacts on Forests and People

Katila, P., Pierce Colfer, C., De Jong, W., Galloway, G., Pacheco, P., & Winkel, G. (Eds.). 2019 Sustainable Development Goals: Their Impacts on Forests and People Forests provide vital ecosystem services crucial to human well-being and sustainable development, and have an important role to play in achieving the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations 2030 Agenda. Little attention, however, has yet focused on how efforts to achieve the SDGs will impact forests and forest-related livelihoods, and how these impacts may, in turn, enhance or undermine the contributions of forests to climate and development. Understanding the potential impacts of [...]

sinceremanage 2020-01-28T17:28:39+00:00 December 20th, 2019|Tags: climate, Governance, livelihoods, Natural Resources Institute Finland, Policy, Research, sustainable development, The European Forest Institute|0 Comments

Connecting with Nature: exploring the ecosystem services concept

Connecting with Nature: exploring the ecosystem services concept

One Earth, a new high-tier, open access, environmental change and sustainability journal from Cell Press (Elsevier), includes a feature on Ecosystem Services in its inaugural edition. Academics from around the world share their views in the article entitled Connecting with Nature, focussing on non-monetary metrics, relational values, reconnecting people to nature, urban nature-based solutions and social values of ecosystems. SINCERE project researcher, Sven Wunder, contributes with reflections on "Mainstreaming Nature? Potentials and Limits". Papers published on One Earth will provide insight into the drivers and scales of environmental change, identify risks and implications for society, and help develop transformative solutions for [...]

sinceremanage 2019-09-16T16:21:03+00:00 September 11th, 2019|Tags: environmental economics, news_all, The European Forest Institute|0 Comments

Funeral Forests: Bridges between two worlds

Bernasconi, A. 2019. Book of Abstracts of the 21th conference of EFUF, p.54 Spiritual forest spaces have a rising importance in society. One example of this trend is the funeral forest. In Switzerland only 10% of the deceased are still buried in a coffin, it is common to spread or bury the departed’s ashes (Donner 2018). Between 2009 and 2013 in Germany the number of tree burials doubled up to 45’000 per year (Bauer und Schraml 2018). Funeral forests are sacred places, grounded on two Cultural Ecosystem Services (CES) of outstanding importance: (a) spiritual and religious meaning and (b) a space of long duration, linking ancestors with [...]

sinceremanage 2019-08-01T18:21:40+00:00 May 31st, 2019|Tags: Funeral forest, Pan Bern AG, Research, Spiritual services, Switz_research, The European Forest Institute|0 Comments

Health and Sport as a Forest Ecosystem Services in Protected Areas and Payment for Ecosystem Services

Jurević Varga, M., Popijač, M., Tišma, S. 2019. Book of Abstracts: 54th Croatian & 14th International Symposium on Agriculture The multifunctional role of the forest is reflected in the preservation of the environment and biodiversity, the mitigation of the consequences of climate change, the preservation of the quality and quantity of drinking water and soil, and it creates the preconditions for the development of green economy. Demand for forest Ecosystem Services (FES) is increasing, due to growing populations and socio-economic changes. The aim of the research is to valorise the health function of the FES and develop the Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) methodology. Public Institution Nature [...]

sinceremanage 2019-09-16T16:27:04+00:00 February 28th, 2019|Tags: Health, Medvednica_research, PES, The European Forest Institute|0 Comments