Harmonising, improving and using social and recreational data in National Forest Inventories across Europe

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Improving land use change tracking in the UK Greenhouse Gas Inventory: final outputs report

This report describes work on the project “Improving Land Use Change Tracking in the UK Greenhouse Gas Inventory” for the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (reference TRN 2384/05/2020). The aim of the project was to make improved estimates of land-use change in the UK, using multiple sources of data. We applied a method for estimating land-use change using a Bayesian data assimilation approach. This allows us to constrain estimates of gross land-use change with national-scale census data, whilst retaining the detailed information available from several other sources. We produced a time series of maps describing our best estimate of land-use change given the available data, as well as the full posterior distribution of this space-time data cube. This quantifies the joint probability distribution of the parameters, and properly propagates the uncertainty from input data to final output. The output data has been summarised in the form of land-use vectors. The results show that we can provide improved estimates of past land-use change using this method. The main advantage of the approach is that it provides a coherent, generalised framework for combining multiple disparate sources of data, and adding further sources of data in future would be straightforward. Future work could focus on more detailed analysis of existing data sets, introducing independent constraints where possible, and obtaining further relevant data sets. The code is available via GitHub

Harmonised projections of future forest resources in Europe

Data PaperAbstract • Key message A dataset of forest resource projections in 23 European countries to 2040 has been prepared for fores trelated policy analysis and decision-making. Due to applying harmonised definitions, while maintaining country-specific forestry practices, the projections should be usable from national to international levels. The dataset can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.4t880qh. The associated metadata are available at https://metadata-afs.nancy.inra.fr/ geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/8f93e0d6-b524-43bd-bdb8-621ad5ae6fa9info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

DIABOLO Task 3.2.2. Development and harmonization of social indicators

The main objective of this subtask (3.2.2) is to evaluate available information/indicators already recorded within the different national NFI’s in relation to estimate the social functions of forest – and to improve the existing indicators. In addition, the possible development of new significant indicators for common reporting related to the social functions within the NFI’s is outlined

Harmonising, improving and using social and recreational data in National Forest Inventories across Europe

Key message: National Forest Inventories (NFIs) hold promise for monitoring and valuing of non-productive forest functions, including social and recreational services. European countries use a range of methods to collect social and recreational information within their NFI methodologies. Data collected frequently included general and recreation-specific infrastructure, but innovative approaches are also used to monitor recreational use and social abuse. Context: Social and recreational indicators are increasingly valued in efforts to measure the non-productive value of forests in Europe. National Forest Inventories (NFIs) can be used to estimate recreational and social usage of forest land at a national level and relate this use to other biophysical, spatial and topographical features. Nonetheless, there is little information concerning the extent. Aims: The study aims to identify the coverage of social and recreational data present in European NFIs including the types of data recorded as part of the NFI methodologies across European countries. It also aims to examine contrasting methods used to record social and recreational data and present recommendations for ways forward for countries to integrate these into NFI practice. Methods: A pan-European questionnaire was designed and distributed to 35 counties as part of the EU-funded project Distributed, Integrated and Harmonised Forest Information for Bioeconomy Outlooks (DIABOLO). The questionnaire probed countries on all social and recreational data that was included within NFIs. Qualitative response data was analysed and recoded to measure the extent of social and recreational data recoded in European NFIs both as a function of the number of variable categories per country and the number of countries recording particular variables. Results: Thirty-one countries reported at least one social or recreational variable over 12 categories of data. The most frequently recorded variables included ownership, general transport infrastructure and recreation-specific infrastructure. Countries collecting data over many different categories included Switzerland, Great Britain, Czech Republic, Luxemburg and Denmark. Conclusion: The study proposes a specific set of indicators, based upon countries with well-developed social and recreational data in their NFIs, which could be used by other countries, and report on the extent to which these are currently collected across Europe. It discusses results and makes a series of recommendations concerning priorities for the inclusion of social and recreational data in European NFIs

Harmonised projections of future forest resources in Europe

• Key message A dataset of forest resource projections in 23 European countries to 2040 has been prepared for forest-related policy analysis and decision-making. Due to applying harmonised definitions, while maintaining country-specific forestry practices, the projections should be usable from national to international levels. The dataset can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.4t880qh . The associated metadata are available at https://metadata-afs.nancy.inra.fr/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/8f93e0d6-b524-43bd-bdb8-621ad5ae6fa9