Forests and Biodiversity

Forests and Biodiversity
Forest policy and conservation
Environmental Pressures on forests
What Countdown partners are doing

Forests and Biodiversity

Forests are an important store of biodiversity in Europe, covering (with other wooded areas) around 40% of the land surface. They are also an important natural resource and provide a number of important ecosystem goods (e.g. source of timber and non-timber products) and services (e.g. as a carbon sink and regulator of soil quality).

European trade with producer countries of wood products, e.g. tropical hardwood, also has a large impact on biodiversity in other regions of the world (the “European ecological footprint”).

Forest policy and conservation

Many different initiatives to manage and protect forests exist and global, European and national level. The EU has no single policy for forests, similar to the Common Agricultural and Fisheries Policies (CAP, CFP), but instead has a number of different strategies, directives, action plans etc.

At the international level forest conservation is primarily coordinated through the Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe (MCPFE), which aims to integrate biodiversity into sustainable forest management. There still requires to be a greater amount of integration of biodiversity and conservation initiatives with forestry is still required. IUCN works inter alia with initiatives such as Pro Silva Europe to develop and promote concepts of close to nature forestry which can deliver environmental goods and services while being economically viable.

Environmental Pressures on forests

The prime threats facing forests are habitat destruction and fragmentation. Fragmentation is primarily the result of industrial harvesting, forest fires and the construction of roads.
During the 1990’s fire destroyed an average of 1.7 million hectares of European forest. In the Mediterranean 50,000 forest fires burnt over 600,000 ha of forest and other wooded areas. This is almost double the figure for the 1970’s. Not all forest fires are negative as burning is a management tool for land clearance and to regenerate growth.
Air pollution is having a major impact on forests. The ICP process has been closely monitoring the effects of air pollution and has shown damaging nitrogen depositions and acidity. Sulphur depositions have decreased over time, primarily due to tough legislation on sulphur emissions in Europe.
Illegal logging is also becoming a problem. Currently there are no comprehensive estimates of the extent of illegal logging. In the Russian Federation there are estimates that it accounts for 20% of all timber sold. Illegal logging is stimulated by a by increased demand for timber and as economies in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States continue to develop, illegal activities are set to increase.
The impacts of climate change on forests will be complex and difficult to predict. For example the International Panel on Climate Change predicts that boreal forests could shift in their zone by 150-550 km over the next century. That would be the fastest rate of migration ever recorded, with unknown consequences for species and ecosystem survival.

Forests and Biodiversity