TOADAPT - Quantifizierung der Anpassungsfähigkeit der Wälder in Europa aus einer sozio-ökonomischen Perspektive

About

Forest disturbances, such as windthrows, insect-outbreaks and wildfires, have become increasingly severe and are expected to worsen due to climate change. The ability of species to adapt to these disturbances will define future forests. However, there are still high uncertainties on quantifying adaptive capacity in forests. Given that forests in Europe are at the interface between ecology and society, their adaptive capacity is affected by both domains, but these are rarely considered together. In this project, I aim quantify adaptive capacity from a socialecological perspective. Specifically, I aim to (i) identify the most common adaptive measures and indicators of forest social-ecological adaptive capacity, and their effect on ecosystem services (WP1); (ii) to understand the regional patterns of forest adaptive capacity from a socialecological perspective (WP2); and to operationalize and map forest adaptive capacity at the continental scale (WP3). I will focus on the regional scale to understand the mechanisms behind adaptive capacity. In contrast, assessing it at the continental scale will allow me to identify the areas with the lowest adaptive capacity to support forest policy and management in Europe. To accomplish this, I will conduct a literature review and expert consultation to identify the critical elements of adaptive capacity. Then, I will gather, harmonize and combine different datasets and maps about ecological and social indicators of adaptive capacity, including social perceptions obtained through stakeholder questionnaires. This project builds upon my previous and ongoing research towards an independent career, expanding my work on vulnerability and risk approaches from an innovative perspective, and will also benefit from my experience with stakeholder studies and data already available and preprocessed. My findings will advance our understanding of resilience and vulnerability. Assessing adaptive capacity from a socialecological perspective will aid in developing adaptive strategies to cope with the future increase in forest disturbances.