Theme 5 | Socio-Economic Conditions and Governance

In the research Theme 1-4, we aim to explore and design new ways of managing Canadian forests to make them more resilient to future conditions, which is what the DIVERSE project is all about. But what good is it if these new ways are impossible to implement on a practical level, or if nobody wants to use them?

Theme 5 aims to evaluate the constraints and obstacles linked to the implementation of the Climate Smart Forestry (CSF) and Functional Complex Network (FCN) management approaches (see Theme 4). In particular, it aims to explore their financial implications, social acceptability, and the possible modifications required to the current Canadian forestry regulation and standards for their implementation. It will also explore the forms of governance that are the most adapted to facilitate the implementation of new forest management strategies focused on the future of forests, and on their resilience.

Such an endeavor requires a multi-disciplinary approach that will require an economic analysis of the forestry sector, but also a study of the acceptability and expectations of many different stakeholders and users of forests. Theme 5 will use different forms of interview of focus groups to present several insights stemming from the previous themes – especially Theme 4 – to better understand how the impacts of the FCN, CSF and BAU (Business As Usual) management strategies are perceived by different actors. As a result, Theme 5 will produce several guidance document for the actors linked to the management of forests in our research sites, but also throughout Canada.

Theme 5 will begin with an evaluation of the environmental and economic issues related to forest management, as perceived by different stakeholders : forestry practitioners, forest agencies, non-government organizations, provincial or federal government employees, Indigenous communities, and other individuals. How do these actors perceive risks and opportunities associated with different forest management strategies? How much do they accept or reject them? This will be done through workshops planned inside each of our research sites, along with semi-structured interviews.

The second step will be to assess the governance systems that will ease the implementation of FCN or CSF management strategies. In governance systems, rights and responsibilities are distributed among different people or organizations. When done right, this distribution favors behaviors that help the system that is being managed through the governance; but if done wrong, decisions can be difficult to make, or become counter-productive as the priorities of each other can clash or become misaligned with what needs to be done. To assess  governance systems, we’ll first take a historical perspective, and look at how such systems have evolved through time to manage forests in our research sites, and what happened as a result of these systems. We will do this through semi-structured interviews of stakeholders in our research sites. Then, we will analyze the scientific literature to try and assess how institutions and organizations linked to forest management can properly respond to the challenges forests will face in the future. In particular, we will use the Social-Ecological Systems (SES) concept, which assesses the dynamic of ecosystems and human societies as a whole, both responding and adapting to changes in the other. We will explore what changes in human societies (price changes, new forest management strategies, etc.) and changes in the ecosystems (increased natural disturbances, diseases, etc.) are the most important to understand how SES will evolve.

Finally, we will focus on the economic feasibility of the FCN and CSF forest management strategy, compared to BAU management. We will work with the forestry actors in each of our research sites to identify the forestry infrastructure necessary to each management scenario, and its implications for the cost of harvesting and forest management. We will also explore how the different management strategies will affect the flows of biomass (wood, fibre) in the forest industry. For example, one management strategy might require that certain tree species be harvested instead of others, which will change the availability of different types of wood. This might influence the entire forest industry in an important way. We will also assess if the different management strategies will be able to sufficiently contribute to the demand for wood products in Canada and beyond, as the demand in wood is expected to increase in the future. In the end, this will make us able to identify the main costs and benefits associated with each management approach, giving important guidance to the forest industries in the future.