SESSION 8

SILVICULTURE, ENVIRONMENTAL AND FOREST POLICY
(Coordinators: Davide Pettenella, Donato Romano)

Forest systems have seen many changes in the last decades. Increase in demand for forest products and services, generated by Italian economic development, has been followed in the last twenty years by deep changes in the context where forest activities take place (globalization, climate change…).

In this framework political action has moved slowly, often following these changes without governing them, through uncoordinated and fragmented interventions which have frequently resulted in conflicting incentives to stakeholders.

In this context, strategies and instruments able to deal with complexity are urgently needed. Methods based on flexible choices are necessary to adapt the dynamics of slowly evolving complex systems, such as forest ecosystems, to the quickly changing social and economic scenario.

From all this there arises the need for a general rethinking of forest policy, based on an accurate analysis of current forest management strategies, and on the definition of appropriate instruments to pursue the goals of a modern society.

Themes

1. Forest policy objectives and instruments

Policy criteria and guidelines for production chains

Policy criteria and guidelines for social functions

Policy instruments

From forest protection to the implementation of silviculture

2. Vertical and horizontal coordination in forest policy

Relationships at International, National and regional level

Relationships between forest policy and other policies

Forest laws and environmental legislation

3. Policies and institutional innovation in relation to specific problems and issues

Local development

New participation form and conflicts resolution

Research and innovation

Technical training, information, education