News and Media

Forests are high on the agenda again – both in the political domain and public attention, and we find them on a sine curve between panacea and crisis mode. Forests and forest management used to be matters of long-time spans and constant, but not abrupt, evolution. In recent years, the approach to forest issues has become more polarised. With climate change, global biodiversity decline, deforestation and forest degradation as predominant triggers, the nature of the debate on forests and policy responses has changed, and lively discussions on the priorities and optimal use of the forest resource are taking place.

European forests have shown quite constant trends since the beginning of Pan-European reporting in 1990. Overall, forest area is increasing, the economic role of forests to the overall economy is rather stable, and there have been some improvements in biodiversity and climate change adaptation. However, there are many short-term impacts on European forest that are more difficult to grasp.

In essence, the central question remains the same: how to accommodate different demands on forests from society, how to reconcile different, often divergent, policy objectives, and how to find robust solutions that create more synergies than trade-offs for these objectives? Solutions and policies must of course be based on objective analysis and the best possible information.

FOREST EUROPE is a voluntary political process that shares the vision that Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) is an approach that is capable of supporting a balanced approach to European forests. It is the carrier of a common definition on SFM for the Pan-European region, and a major player in reporting and communicating forest information. This paper is an attempt to discuss the current state of play in and around European forests in the well-accepted framework of SFM and its instruments.

Check our report here! (click on the picture)