MINUTES OF THE 1ST IMACFORD MEETING IN BARCELONA

ON NOVEMBER 16TH

 

MORNING SESSION:

 

The first morning session was chaired by José Antonio Bonet, who introduced the speakers of the session:

 

First presentation:  Pere Riera presented the activities and Network of MEDFOREX and IMACFORD. This and subsequent presentations are available at http://www.medforex.net/imacford.

 

Second presentation: Leena Roihuvuo presented the EU 6th Framework Programme. Yves Birot raised a question on IP (Integrated Projects) included in the EU 6th Framework Programme and the need to include forestry in other projects on waters, biodiversity, etc.

 

Participants asked to have the presentation and documentation provided by Leena Roihuvuo in the afternoon sessions for further discussion in the working groups.

 

Third presentation: Lelia Croitoru made a presentation on the inventory of externalities within the MEDFOREX project, titled ‘An attempt towards assessing forest public goods and externalities in the Mediterranean basin’. She focussed on the identification and quantification of MEDiterranean FORest public goods and EXternalities, paying special attention to the differences in Northern and Southern Mediterranean countries.

 

Participants asked for a longer version of Lelia Croitoru’s  presentation (which is included in Medforex webpage). There was a debate on whether it was possible in countries such as France, Italy, Spain or Portugal to consider only the areas with Mediterranean forests for their study. Yves Birot added that the data from countries which do not only have Mediterranean forests is generally biased. Eduardo Rojas remarked that both erosion and forest fires are critical issues, which need to be dealt with a lot of caution.

Additionally, there was also discussion on the term “externalities”. Pere Riera pointed out that the term externality was misused. This term is better understood when seen as “effects”. He explained that The TEV approach does not include the concept externality, but use and non-use values. Moreover, it does not split in private and external goods. They are concerned with the value of forest and they deal with the benefit side, that is, the willingness to pay for the forests, never mind the cost.

 

After the coffee break, Marc Palahí was the chairperson for the following 5 end-user presentations of the morning session.

 

Fourth presentation: Anna Borràs gave the first  end-users presentation on the wood industry in Spain and Catalonia and she also mentioned their point of view on the research needs for this sector. Anna Borràs referred to the prevalence of small-sized wood companies in Spain, its familiar and low-connected structure with little information on the markets.

 

The importance of gathering data on forest industry was remarked in the questions after this presentation, due to the lack of data on forest firms.  There are some databases at CTFC, but there is still much work to be done. Pulp industry is not an important industry in Catalonia.

 

Fifth presentation: Pablo Navascués made the second end-user presentation regarding the work done by Diputació de Barcelona on two main programmes: forest fire prevention and associative management of private woodlands (through forest owners associations). He pointed out the high number of municipalities in the province of Barcelona with fire prevention plans, which include not only human and material resources, but also educational activities for the general public. Regarding forest owners associations, he stressed the importance of private owners working together –with the help of the administration- in order to obtain more benefits. Finally, he mentioned possible research lines that would be useful to improve their work.

After this presentation, reference was done to existing research on forest fires and their networks and the importance of forest fire research, risk management and fuel and vegetation management was emphasised.

There was a debate on the cause of forest fires and the availability of this kind of information. It was said that big forest fires are deliberately caused, although negligence is also a relevant cause and most forest fires have an unknown origin. The  controversial issues of non-profitability of Mediterranean forest  (which is a very deliberated issues) and of the use machinery in the forest were raised. It was mentioned that machines are not as flexible as manual work and they are also be very expensive, especially if the volume of production is low.

Pablo Navascués clarified the function of forest owners associations: forests owners in ADFs have specific rules to contribute to fires prevention (which is their main aim), but also have other functions in forest management. He also clarified that Diputació de Barcelona is not interfering in the management of legally protected natural areas.

 

Sixth presentation: Theodoros Ikonomou –member of a forest owner association in Greece- made the third enduser presentation. He focussed on the need to include also social sciences in forestry research. His argument was based in the fact that Mediterranean countries with similar physical conditions perform differently in forest management, due to its social and historical tradition.

After this presentation, the need to include all stakeholders (and not only end-users) in forest research  and the relevance of integrated programmes for sustainable forest management was mentioned.

 

Seventh presentation: Xavier Escuté Gasulla made the fourth end-user presentation on behalf of Centre Excursionista de Catalunya (CEC) concerning their perceptions and opinions about forests. CEC is one of the biggest and oldest mounteneering organisations in Catalonia, which is involved in conservationist, cultural and recreational activities related to forests. He pointed out the features that visitors search in the forest, such as quietness, an appealing and diverse landscape, etc. However, he also referred to the disturbances on forests caused by the raising numbers of recreationists.  According to him, future research should be related mostly to the change in forest structure.

 

After this presentation, a reflection on the fact that recreation is the soul of non-use forest values was done.

 

Eighth presentation: Finally, Marc Comalrenar presented the point of view of hunters towards forestry. He pointed out the change in the landscape in the last 20 years together with the depletion of small game animals, although big animals have increased. He emphasised that hunting cannot be carried out together with other forest activities at the same time because it is dangerous. However, in his opinion, most forest owners obtain benefits from hunting activities and efforts should be done in order to combine the various forest uses and forest owners’ interests.

 

After this presentation, participants talked about the conflicting needs and interests (hunting, walking, bird-watching, etc.) that different endusers have regarding forests. Some participants also mentioned the importance to make these various forest needs compatible. Yves Birot said that this issue could be addressed through a participatory approach to land management, taking also into account an integrated management and territorial approach in order to also deal with rural decline. Concerning hunting, Eduard Rojas remarked that there is a strong power struggle, which also involves  the issue of equity. It can be private or public. For example,  in the Spanish “latifundios” hunting rights are very expensive, while in coastal areas (with a high fragmentation rate) hunting is free.

 

AFTERNOON SESSION

 

Group discussions: After lunch, participants were split in two groups in order to discuss the three following questions:

 

–Could you list the main topics of social concern in relation to Mediterranean forests?

–Could you rank the items by blocks, according to your perception of end-user relevance?

–What means do you suggest to keep coordination between researchers and end-users?

 

 

GROUP 1:

 

GROUP 2:

 

Group Presentations: After the discussion in groups Andreas Ottisch made the presentation concerning the discussion carried out by group 2 and Eduard Rojas presented the main issues raised by group 1 in their discussion.

 

General  Discussion

 

Yves Birot was the chairperson for the group discussion in the afternoon session. He pointed out that there were many commonalities between both groups, although the first group made more effort in translating social needs into research priorities.

 

Pere Riera asked participants whether they agreed in including their presentations, the minutes of the meeting and other results in the MEDFOREX- IMACFORD webpage so that everybody could see and download it.

 

Andreas Ottisch asked if the participants thought that the discussion had been relevant to the title of the meeting. In response to that, Pere Riera pointed out that workshop 1 (Barcelona) and workhop 2 (Lisbon) were seen as a part of the same block, and that there will be a single report on both of them.

 

Pere Riera congratulated the presentations and expressed his hope that this meeting will be helpful for improving research.

 

The topic of multidisciplinarity in forestry education was discussed. The research carried out by CREAF was briefly explained by Javier Retana. Their team consists in biologists, ecologists, geographers and scientists with different backgrounds. The same happens in CTFC.

 

Andreas Ottisch made the point that forestry issues are integrated into other areas of society (for example, there is a close link between forestry and rural development), but this makes it difficult for forest institutions, as they compete with agriculture or water related institutions. Forest institutions do not have any special status.

 

Eduard Rojas pointed out that multidisciplinarity of forestry issues opens doors.

 

Pere Riera asked whether forestry as a discipline or career was changing its contents. That is, he asked if a forester was better now than 20 years ago.

 

In response to that, Marc Palahí answered that it is changing into environmental management.

 

Regarding this issue, Eduard Rojas mentioned that the Congress of Spanish Forest Engineers deals with their future. He highlighted that in Spain corporation is very high and that makes changes in the sector are slower. He thinks that specialising in environmental management is coming. However, in his opinion, there are strong difficulties to obtain horizontal cross-sectoral structures due to strong corporative structures or other reasons.

 

Yves Birot emphasised that a shift towards environmental issues and ecosystems management should not lead to forget wood production functions, which are paying to ensure the other forest functions. In his opinion, the productive function of forest is still important. On the other hand,

 

Andreas Ottisch pointed out that in Austria and Germany, which are countries with a strong forest tradition, there are also changes and there is a need for a reform. He mentioned that it is nowadays difficult to find employment for forest engineers and that there is less profitability in forests. Also, Andreas Ottisch said that there is a degree in the Netherlands called ‘Forest and Nature’ (they do not mention forestry), and that little attention is given to tree-cutting in some countries.

 

Eduardo Rojas said that there is a high level in sciences such as botany, edaphology, etc, but that there are still important weaknesses in social sciences (which try to reach society needs in relation to forests and vice versa).

 

 

Conclusion:

 

As a conclusion, Pere Riera summarised the various parts of meeting and  the presentations: a presentation of MEDFROREX and IMACFORD, a EU 6th Framework Programme, a summary of forest functions in the Mediterranean, and 5 end-users presentations.  He highlighted the intention of IMACFORD to bring forest end-users and their needs into the research agenda, which was not done in MEDFOREX previously. Also, he pointed out that workshop 1 and 2 of the IMACFORD project consist in identifying and prioritising what the important issues in relation to sustainable Mediterranean forests are, whereas workshop 3 in Avignon will be addressed to researchers. He explained that after these two first workshops it is expected to shape a  research agenda for sustainable Mediterranean forests. The challenge, after obtaining different ideas from different parts in the workshops, will be to put them together and find the right way for future research.