The contribution to forest conservation and restoration in Sweden of small, protected patches on private forest land

Sammanfattning

In forest regions worldwide, the extent of industrial forestry footprint challenges biodiversity conservation and calls for advanced protection and ecological restoration. The conservation efficiency of protected areas needs to be improved, and forest ecosystems need to be set in a state that favors biodiversity, resilience, and provisioning of ecosystem services. Sweden hosts a large share of the European forests, with dominance of non-industrial forest ownership and extensive forestry footprint, hence with a strong need for expanded conservation, restoration, and multiple-use targets. Protection through voluntary Nature Conservation Agreements and regulated Biotope Protection Areas exists since the 1990s, supported by economic compensation to landowners. Across entire Sweden and all ecoregions, we assessed their abundance over a 30-year period, including forest types, restoration practices, rotation intervals, and selection of tree species. These nearly 14,000 patches covering over 70,000 ha are small with a median area of 3-4 ha and rarely larger than 20 ha. Their contribution is important, particularly in southern Sweden with low and fragmented forest cover distributed among many different owners. A decreasing trend in protection is alarming since these contribute to representative forest type across the forest landscape of Sweden. Active restoration dominates over passive set-asides; coniferous forest types are less represented than more rare forest types, many different tree species are favored, and different restoration practices occur, but with few dominating. While recognizing the important contribution, we find that the restoration practices are narrow and repetitive and that a greater diversification is needed to improve conservation and multiple-use targets of forests.

Nyckelord

biodiversity; boreal; boreonemoral; ecological restoration; nemoral; private forest owners

Publicerad i

Restoration Ecology
2025
Utgivare: WILEY

SLU författare

• Svensson, Johan

  • Institutionen för vilt, fisk och miljö, Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet
    

• Lopéz Peinado, Andrés

  • Institutionen för vilt, fisk och miljö, Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet
    

• Jonsson, Bengt-Gunnar

  • Institutionen för vilt, fisk och miljö, Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet
    
  • Mittuniversitetet

• Singh, Navinder

  • Institutionen för vilt, fisk och miljö, Sveriges lantbruksuniversitet
    

UKÄ forskningsämne

Ekologi
Skogsvetenskap

Publikationens identifierare

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/rec.14390

Permanent länk till denna sida (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/141096