Conflicting objectives in production forests pose a challenge for forest management

Abstract

Conflicts among different ecosystem services have been shown to be common and potentially exacerbated by management interventions. In order to improve the sustainability of natural resource use, the occurrence of these conflicts and the effects that management actions have on them need to be understood. We studied the conflicts between ecosystem services and the potential to solve them by management choices in boreal production forests. Our study area consisted of nearly 30,000 forest stands which were simulated for 50 years into the future under alternative management scenarios. The study included four ecosystem services – timber production, bilberry production, carbon storage, and pest regulation – and one biodiversity conservation objective defined as availability of deadwood resources. We 1) measured the conflicts among each pair of objectives, and 2) identified a compromise solution for each pairwise conflict defined as one which simultaneously minimizes the losses for both objectives. Our results show that conflicts between timber production and other objectives are typical, severe, and difficult to solve, while non-extractive benefits including biodiversity conservation can be more easily reconciled with each other. To mitigate the most severe conflicts in boreal forests, increased diversity in management regimes is required.