GIS analysis of potentials for profitable management of voluntary preserved conservation forests in Sweden

Purpose and goal

The aim of the project was to describe forests in Sweden aimed for nature conservation management (NCM). These forests are voluntary preserves and are therefore not the subject for national reviews. The accompanying goal was to describe the profitability of management of these areas since one of the main issues is a lack of NCM, causing sub-optimal land use. The results from the project will be of great use for Swedish forestry in the efforts to increase the quality of nature conservation forestry.

Expected results and effects

The project was expected to contribute with knowledge in order to describe forests aimed for nature conservation management (NCM) in Sweden and to calculate the profitability of performing management of these forests. The project has designed a method to describe these areas and thereafter calculate profitability of NCM. The expectations is that the methodology is applicable to all forest land which would enable identification, and management, of ”high-quality” areas, e.g. places with higher biodiversity and more values in need of protection and management.

Planned approach and implementation

Previous research has concluded that remote sensing analysis cannot be used for detailed analysis of conservational values but is best left to in-field inventory. The method designed, and applied, used forestry science expertise from the researchers at Skogforsk, expertise on systems analysis at IIASA and data from Swedish forestry companies. The method gave opportunities to describe NCM areas in Sweden using only basic, publicly available data. This created the intended rough sorting of areas and their profitability. This can then be used to direct the detailed inventory efforts.