We regularly undertake research ourselves, often in collaboration with partners, and publish the findings here in our Forestry Horizons library. We also support two main research initiatives: our Sylva Scholarship and the T10Q project.
| Sylva Scholarship | Top Ten Questions in Forestry (T10Q) |
About the Sylva Scholarship
The Sylva Scholarship was launched in Autumn 2010 in partnership with the Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford (Plant Sciences).
This is an important initiative under our Science programme, aiming to advance sustainable forest management through research and communication by supporting a research studentship at the Department.The theme of the scholarship is healthy trees and productive forests. This reflects a joint vision between the Sylva Foundation and Plant Sciences to foster a robust tree and forest resource in the light of projected environmental change. Changes in the frequency and occurrence of pests and pathogens are seen as significant potential threats to our tree resource. Increased stress on tree health is anticipated with environmental change, further increasing tree susceptibility to pests and pathogens. Impacts in the forest ecosystem as a result of changes to management practise and environmental variability are also poorly understood. Maintaining a healthy and functioning tree resource is critically important to support the delivery of a wide range of sustainable outputs, including wood products for a low carbon society.
2010 Sylva Scholarship programme
| Sylva Scholar: | Kirsty Monk | ||
| Research Title: | The consequences of management and climate change for ecosystem function: a case study of cord-forming fungi in English woodlands.
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| Institution: | |
Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford. | |
Partners: |
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Natural History Museum, London |
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Summary of research
Two major challenges face UK forestry over the next half century:
- Meeting increased demand for wood and other forest products and services in a sustainable fashion;
- Managing shifts in the species composition of semi-natural stands in response to environmental change without loss of productive or ecosystem functions.
Forests in the UK are currently valued as much for their biodiversity, carbon storage and environmental services as they are for their capacity to produce useable wood. However, the majority of lowland broadleaf woodland is unmanaged and much is neglected. Growing emphasis on reducing carbon emissions through increased use of locally-produced timber and biofuel will provide a powerful incentive to make these woods more productive. It is uncertain whether management for production will have positive or negative impacts on biodiversity and other environmental services. It is clear that in order to maintain and enhance production new provenances and species will need to be introduced that are better adapted to novel environmental conditions. A major concern is that such introductions (either through planting or colonisation) may have significant impacts on many important ecosystem processes such as carbon cycling, disease dynamics and trophic webs, and that this may have an impact on sustainability.
In this study we propose to examine whether changes to the management regime and species composition of UK broadleaved woodland are likely to have a significant impact on ecosystem function. We will do this by investigating their effects on an important group of ‘ecosystem engineers’ – the cord-forming fungi (CFF).
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Download an outline of the 2010 research project: The consequences of management and climate change for ecosystem function: a case study of cord-forming fungi in English woodlands. |
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Download an outline of the Sylva Scholarship programme |
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Current news from our blog about the Sylva Scholarship programme |
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The T10Q project has been undertaken by a research group based at the University of Oxford, and has been looking at ways in which we can build links between practice, science and policy in forestry. It has been supported by the Sylva Foundation, and led by DPhil research student Gillian Petrokofsky.Four hundred and eighty people responded to online surveys and suggested almost 1600 questions that they believed to be of vital importance to forestry research in the UK and Ireland. A workshop was held in Oxford in 2009 to discuss the main themes from the surveys. This led to the identification of the Top Ten Questions for Forestry:
- What are the most technically and cost effective ways of identifying, monitoring, and controlling invasive species, pests and disease?
- How can we achieve better understanding between foresters and other parts of society?
- What are the most effective landscape planting schemes to ensure connectivity between woodland fragments whilst maintaining connectivity between other landuse types?
- How will climate change affect both natural forest ecosystems and forestry and how should management be adapted to minimise adverse impacts and optimise benefits?
- What is the value of forestry to human health and well-being?
- Who are the private woodland owners and how can they be engaged and influenced? What are their concerns?
- Which parts of forest ecosystems form the largest and most stable carbon pools and how are these impacted by forest management and climate change?
- How can we address the economic, environmental, social and institutional constraints of expanding woodfuel in the UK?
- What species or provenances should we be considering in relation to a range of forestry systems including urban and agroforestry, in the light of climate change?
- What are the barriers to knowledge transfer in forestry from research to practice and how can they be removed?
Publications
Two papers have been published describing the process and the results:
- Petrokofsky G, et al. (2010) A participatory process for identifying and prioritizing policy-relevant research questions in natural resource management: a case study from the UK forestry sector. Forestry.
- Petrokofsky G, Hemery G, Brown N. (2008) Knowledge feeds decision making: the people's say in UK forestry. Quarterly Journal of Forestry 102: 221-225 pp.
Both papers are available for download in the forest policy section of our library.
The research project also looks at the wider issue of evidence-based policy making in forestry and the role of systematic reviews. More information on these topics is found on the Google Group Evidence-based Forestry. A systematic review on methods of carbon stock assessment in terrestrial biomass is currently being progressed under the UN-REDD programme (see here).
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