Mark your calendar!

The 26th IUFRO World Congress https://iufro2024.com/ will take place in less than one and a half years on 23-29 June 2024. The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) and the City of Stockholm in close collaboration with the Nordic and Baltic partners, are looking forward to welcoming delegates from all over the world to Stockholm.

Get inspired by this video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ce9Ymahe0AA

"The IUFRO World Congress provides a unique opportunity to present the rich and diverse forest landscapes of the Nordic and Baltic countries, including world leading research, innovations, stakeholders and a vast variety of cultures. Our Nordic and Baltic partners are all strongly committed to making this Congress a great success", says Fredrik Ingemarson of SLU and Chair of the Congress Organizing Committee (COC).

Read a report from the most recent partner meeting: 
https://iufro2024.com/strong-commitment-by-nordic-and-baltic-partners-for-the-iufro-world-congress-2024/

Present your research!

The Call for Abstracts https://iufro2024.com/call-for-congress-abstracts/ is open and will close in June 2023, when the early birds among you will already be able to register! The Congress Scientific Committee (CSC) has rolled out an exciting array of sessions addressing all five sub-themes of the Congress. Stakeholder discussions, excursions before, during and after the Congress, an exhibition, enjoyable social events and more will round off the program.

The overarching theme of the Congress is Forests and Society Towards 2050. CSC Chair Elena Paoletti, researcher at the Research Institute on Terrestrial Ecosystems of the National Research Council (Cnr-Iret) of Italy, explains the rationale behind the theme, "We decided to focus on forest contributions to the United Nations 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals. Obviously, demands on forest ecosystem services are rising due to many reasons, in particular the climate crisis, the need to reinforce the economy and the increasing demand for healthy forests to render societal services. Also, forest resilience to disturbances and other anthropogenic pressures are of crucial importance. We selected the year 2050, because it is a landmark year to achieve the vision of Living in Harmony with Nature formulated by the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Net Zero Emissions goal."

Win an award!

This Congress provides us with another opportunity to honor outstanding scientific achievements and contributions to forest-related research and practice with a range of IUFRO Awards. Please nominate suitable candidates for the various categories of awards by 15th May 2023.

Find out more at:  https://www.iufro.org/discover/awards/

For the Scientific Achievement Award (SAA), the Outstanding Doctoral Research Award (ODRA) and the IUFRO Student Award for Excellence in Forest Science (ISA), candidates need to be nominated.

However, for the 69 Best Poster Awards (BPA) that shall be presented at the Congress, you just need to apply for being considered when you submit a poster abstract. Make sure you meet the criteria, because the award is only open to under-graduate students, graduate students and individuals who completed their graduate degrees up to 7 years prior to the Congress. The awardee's parent organization must be a Member Organization of IUFRO, or the awardee must be an Individual Member of IUFRO.

Former award winner Sarah Burns from the National University of La Plata, Argentina, says about the ODRA she won at the 2019 IUFRO World Congress in Curitiba, Brazil, "It was an honor to get such an award and to be selected among many other PhDs. This also opened the opportunity to be more involved with IUFRO and become an officeholder. An award gives you more visibility within the IUFRO network and this opens more research and collaboration opportunities also outside IUFRO." Listen to more at:  https://www.iufro.org/discover/awards/

Join the discussion!

The IUFRO World Congress is one of the largest global forest events with several thousand participants. Since the first Congress in 1893, the event, which takes place every five years, has grown into a collaborative global networking platform with great opportunities for knowledge sharing and getting access to the latest science and research related to forests, trees and forest products.

IUFRO President John Parrotta, US Forest Service, Research & Development, explains, "The Congress is attended mostly by scientists from research institutes and universities, but it also attracts a lot of students, both undergraduate and postgraduate, as we offer many opportunities for young scientists to present their work. Many of IUFRO's stakeholders also join the Congress, including decisionmakers at all levels - from forest managers, business leaders and representatives of communities to forest policy makers. This diversity among Congress delegates gives us an opportunity to exchange perspectives between the scientific community and those who we hope our science is serving."

The outcome of the event will contribute to setting future research agendas and developing a roadmap for next generations. The Congress will offer arenas for innovation, forward-looking dialogues, and strong collaborations. We hope for a robust discussion within the forest science community and other sciences as well as with stakeholders from policy, civil society and business, and place special emphasis on next generations and green employment.

The IUFRO-Mondi Partnership held its 2nd Think Tank Meeting in Vienna, Austria, on 3 November 2022. Twenty-five participants representing science, forest industry and policy makers participated in the meeting to address the question:  "What are appropriate response measures to address future and diverse demands on forests?"

Report and presentations with information per country available now!

Educators from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand gathered to discuss forest and landscape restoration education in a three-day virtual workshop (17-19 October 2022). This came about in response to globally increasing demand for knowledge and expertise in landscape restoration. The aim was to share knowledge and experiences about existing natural resources management education systems and explore opportunities for closer regional collaboration.

The Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE) and Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy (IGNFA) hosted this workshop in collaboration with the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO), Global Landscapes Forum (GLF), and Wageningen University and Research (WUR).

The meeting kicked off revisiting definitions and concepts that are in use around the world related to restoration, for example, integrated land management, forest landscape restoration, think landscape, rewilding, and ecosystem restoration and adaptation. This set the stage for exploring how these concepts are included in existing curricula and how they could be integrated into restoration-focused educational programs.

Then participants took turns presenting the landscape/ecosystem restoration agenda in each country and the situation of teaching restoration at both academic and technical levels. They showed a diversity of topics covered in the existing curricula and identified the types of knowledge and skills needed for landscape restoration ranging from basic restoration concepts, ecology and stakeholder interactions to implementation including monitoring, governance and policy issues. The group concluded that educators in the region are sensitized about the importance of restoration becoming an integral part of education.

Discussions on ways and means to enhance restoration aspects in current education systems highlighted - amongst others - revision of curricula, design of stand-alone restoration courses, practical on-site teaching, enhanced cooperation with agencies implementing landscape restoration and inclusion of facilitation skills in teaching restoration.

New ideas for advancing restoration education were touched upon and included issues such as developing transformative curricula with focus on solutions for restoration; teachers acting as facilitators of the learning process; creating a positive learning environment for enhancing the skills and attitudes to systematically "think landscape"; empowering students to "act landscape" through experiential and practice-based learning with actionable tools; and developing critical mindsets to become agents of change.

In the context of the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, which aims at restoring at least one billion hectares of degraded lands globally, these diverse skills are crucial for an ecosystem restoration that not only focuses on forests but aims to restore a wide range of ecological and socio-economic functions of savannas, wetlands, coastal and urban zones. Mainstreaming restoration education across disciplines will help to respond to rapidly developing labor markets, and lead to better design and implementation.

Overall, sharing country expertise through regional networking, like in this workshop and beyond, is useful to enhance education systems eventually capable of producing professionals ready to work in the complex social-ecological systems in which landscape restoration initiatives take place.

The workshop was initiated by the IUFRO Special Programme for Development of Capacities and supported with funds from of Republic of Korea's National Institute of Forest Science, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland and United States Forest Service. The next workshop is expected to take place as a physical meeting in Dehradun, India in March 2023.

For more information, click:  https://www.iufro.org/science/special/spdc/netw/flr/ks-ws/reksw/
Landscape Academy:  https://academy.globallandscapesforum.org/restoration-education/

IUFRO and its local partner, the Centre for Applied Systems Analysis (CASA), implemented a three-year project (September 2019 - August 2022) to develop capacities on forest landscape restoration (FLR) in Malawi. The project's aim was to scale up FLR through developing a critical mass of well-trained practitioners. It was funded by the Audemars-Watkins Foundation and additional financial contributions were provided by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland, as well as in-kind contributions by CASA.

Find out more about the project, its history and especially the impact it has had on the ground:
https://www.iufro.org/science/special/spdc/netw/flr/cb-flr-malsri/mal/

Report by Bianca N.I. Eskelson, Coordinator, IUFRO Research Group 4.01.00 Forest Mensuration and Modelling
https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-4/40000/40100/

On 26 January 2023 another webinar was held as part of the "Forest Mensuration and Modelling Chats" organized by Research Group 4.01.00 and hosted by the University of British Columbia. The webinar series is meant to highlight forest mensuration and modelling research across a variety of research areas and allow for scientific exchange across the globe.

Drs. Sheng-I Yang (Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee) and Thomas Brandeis (Supervisory Research Forester with the Southern Research Station, USDA Forest Service) talked about modelling allometric relationships for Caribbean trees using a mixed-effects random forest algorithm. The background information of the project was given, including the description of the long-term permanent plots in Caribbean islands, the needs of models, the Caribbean forests and land management history. The model building procedure, challenges and results (e.g., key variables, model performance) were covered.

Video recordings of the webinar, which was attended by 56 participants from all over the world, can be found either on the 4.01.00 homepage, in the Unit Noticeboard item, or on the publications page:
https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-4/40000/40100/publications/

The next webinar is scheduled for Tuesday, March 28, 2023, 8:05 – 9:00 am Pacific Daylight Time (PDT). Dr.Sonja Vospernik, Associate Professor at BOKU University of Natural Resources, Vienna, Austria, will talk about "Tree species growth of oak and pine in mixture - a dynamic sensitive equilibrium".
Find out more at:  https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-4/40000/40100/

Report by the IEFC Communication Officer

The webinar series, which is co-organized by the IEFC, the IUFRO Task Force "Resilient Planted Forest Serving Society & Bioeconomy" and the EFI Research Network on Planted Forests, continued on 13 January 2023 with an episode on tree breeding, which attracted 64 participants. Click to rewatch (login required): 
https://www.iefc.net/13-01-2023-lets-talk-about-planted-forests-tree-breeding-replay/

During this webinar, the B4EST project https://b4est.eu/ partners commented on the main outcomes of the project, which ended in 2022. This webinar was an opportunity to discuss how new tools for tree breeding can help to better adapt forest plantations to global change, what are the application recommendations and tools developed during the project, and what legal issues and policy needs have been identified.

Three experts were invited and shared their views and knowledge with the participants:

Mats Berlin, SKOGFORSK:  "Better selection of forest reproductive material (FRM) – now and in the future"
Egbert Beuker, LUKE:  "Legal barriers and policy needs for marketing improved forest reproductive material (FRM) in Europe"
Catherine Bastien, INRAE:  "Transformative changes in tree breeding to meet European forest challenges regarding global changes"
Participants concluded among other things that expectations of the forest community towards breeders have shifted a lot over the last decade towards placing a stronger focus on resilience. Molecular tools, but also decision support tools developed during the B4EST project, such as a tree planter's guide or the Climate Downscaling Tool (ClimateDT) will support this new trend.

A strong political message coming out from the project is also to improve policy regulation to facilitate assisted migration and maintain forest health security while at the same time making science-based decisions.

Find out more at:  https://www.iefc.net/iefc-webinars-replays-lets-talk-about-planted-forests/
Visit the Task Force website:  https://www.iufro.org/science/task-forces/resilient-planted-forests/

YFPD was a three-day digital event covering the forest sector's multi-disciplinarity and gave the speakers and attendees a platform to share their knowledge and experience. (Also see IUFRO News issue 1, 2023, page 7:  https://www.iufro.org/publications/news/electronic-news/article/2023/01/31/iufro-news-vol-52-issue-1-january-2023/)

The final report presents the primary outcomes of the YFPD 2022 for knowledge sharing, capacity building, and organizing similar events in the future. The event brought the policy field to life with inspiring experts including from IUFRO, motivated youth and concrete learning opportunities.

Check this link for more information:  https://ifsa.net/youth-forest-policy-days-report/

Report by Luan Junwei, Deputy Coordinator, IUFRO Working Party 8.01.07 Hydrologic processes and watershed management https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-8/80000/80100/80107/

On 19 December 2022 members of the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP15) announced the passage of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. A new biodiversity framework has been set to radically scale up humankind’s actions to safeguard the planet, with the International Centre for Bamboo and Rattan (ICBR) http://eng.icbr.ac.cn/ ready to play an active role.

The second part convened from 7 December 2022 to 19 December 2022 in Montreal, Canada. In attendance were Cai Chunju and Luan Junwei, professors at ICBR. As part of the UN Biodiversity Conference, ICBR hosted a hybrid side event on Bamboo Forest Biodiversity, the Ecological-Economic Complex, and Carbon Sinks http://www.icbr.ac.cn/Item/14312.aspx, where participants gathered to discuss the interplay between bamboo, rattan and biodiversity. This side event focused on the introduction of the characteristics and main functions of bamboo forests in ecosystems, as well as the value of bamboo forest biodiversity, increasing the awareness of the value of growth, utilization and biodiversity of bamboo forests, and expanding the influence of bamboo forest research worldwide.

A biodiversity crisis and rapidly changing climate demand far-reaching and profound multilateral action across governments, academics, the private sector, local communities and more. The totality of our response, including our ability to marshal the resources to support it, will shape the course of human development.

The passage of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework gives us new hope for the next decade of policy. It represents an important step towards rethinking and reforging our relationship with the planet as a critical part of our response to challenges that are global in scope. ICBR is proud to rise with the world to meet these challenges.

Article by Purabi Bose, Senior Lecturer at SLU, Sweden, and IUFRO Division 6 Coordinator,
https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-6/60000/

Increasingly the scientific community is recognizing the important role of 'storytelling' through popular science. Purabi Bose, course leader of a new SILVA Ph.D. course, Communicating Forests and Land-Use Research in Popular Science, considers the role of the researchers in communicating science to a wider audience as an integral element of doing science. This international Ph.D. course taps into developing this skill among Ph.D. candidates at SLU's Forest Faculty and other international HEIs.

Read at:  https://internt.slu.se/en/news-originals/2023/2/popular-science-communicating-forest-research/

Bangor University, U.K., has secured 9 Commonwealth Scholarship Commission (CSC) scholarships to award to exceptional international scholars to study either:  MSc Agroforestry & Food Security or MSc Tropical Forestry via distance learning starting in September 2023.

These scholarships are exclusively for scholars from the following developing Commonwealth countries:  Bangladesh, Belize, Cameroon, Eswatini, Gabon, Ghana, India, Kenya, Kiribati, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Samoa, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, The Gambia, Togo, Tuvalu, Uganda, Vanuatu, Zambia.

Details:  https://www.bangor.ac.uk/sns/commonwealth-scholarship-commission

Deadline:  30 April 2023!

The Board of the Marcus Wallenberg Foundation and its Selection Committee invite individuals and institutions, globally, to nominate candidates for the Marcus Wallenberg Prize, between 1 February and 30 April each year. The Prize is awarded to recognize, encourage and stimulate path-breaking scientific achievements which contribute significantly to broader knowledge and/or technical development within all subjects relevant to the forest-based sector all over the world.

Find out more:  https://www.mwp.org/nomination/

The IUFRO community is deeply grieved by the passing of Walter Liese, IUFRO Honorary Member and former IUFRO President.

Read the eulogy for Walter Liese by former IUFRO President Salleh Mohd. Nor:
https://www.iufro.org/news/article/2023/03/01/obituary-walter-liese-1926-2023/

Walter Liese was a Full Professor of Wood Biology at the University of Hamburg, Germany, and Director of the Institute for Wood Biology and Protection at the Federal Research Center for Forestry and Forest Products (BFH) from 1963 until his retirement in 1991. He was the author and co-author of about 500 scientific papers and 10 books on topics ranging from wood anatomy and wood quality to wood preservation, bamboo and rattan. After his retirement he increased his work on bamboo and rattan growing and utilization.

Professor Liese has had one of the longest histories of service to IUFRO, organizing and attending numerous IUFRO events. He promoted the international expansion of IUFRO as well as its representation in a number of governing bodies. At the 16th IUFRO Congress in Oslo, Norway (1976), he was elected IUFRO President for 1977-1981, and put a lot effort into organizing the first IUFRO Congress in Asia (Kyoto, Japan, 1981). Read about his remarkable career and many achievements on page 44 ofHONORARY MEMBERS OF IUFRO:  1953 – 2019:  https://www.iufro.org/uploads/media/iufro-honorary-members-2019.pdf

IUFRO President John Parrotta wrote, "He was indeed a true friend of IUFRO over many decades, and a wonderful role model to so many. He will be missed, but his memory, and the 'IUFRO Spirit' which he exemplified, will continue to inspire us all. May he rest in peace." On behalf of the entire IUFRO community we express our heartfelt condolences to his family and friends.

Have a look at this brief annual report to review highlights and nuggets of information from IUFRO network activities throughout 2022. A full annual report will follow in spring 2023.

Find the short IUFRO annual report 2022 at:
https://www.iufro.org/publications/annual-report/article/2023/02/20/2022-in-a-nutshell-a-short-annual-report/

IUFRO Occasional Paper No. 36, February 2023

By John A. Stanturf, William J. Harvey, Gillian Petrokofsky, András Darabant, Leo Petrokofsky, Shankar Adhikari, Gurveen Arora, Jan Bannister, Mercy Derkyi, Ernest Foli, Manuel R. Guariguata, Maria Laura Quevedo Fernandez, Alma L. Trujillo-Miranda

Nature-based concepts have been embraced by different scientific disciplines and operationalized by practitioners in different ecological, social and historic contexts. Rewilding and Forest Landscape Restoration originated in the academic world and were embraced by policy organizations and popularized by NGOs; other terms, such as Ecosystem-Based Adaptation and Nature-Based Solutions, followed the opposite path, from the policy vernacular to the scientific.

This report seeks to clarify how seven common terms and concepts are used in the scientific literature, namely Nature-Based Solution, Ecosystem Based Adaptation, Integrated Landscape Management, Forest Restoration, Forest Landscape Restoration, Afforestation and Rewilding, and how to use them more effectively to support forest landscape restoration implementation.

More information:  https://www.iufro.org/news/article/2023/02/23/occasional-paper-no-36-forest-related-nature-based-approaches-review-of-terms-and-concepts-fr/

Download at:  https://www.iufro.org/publications/series/

The January 2023 issue of IUFRO-Japan News features:  - a Participation Report on the ALL-IUFRO CONFERENCE 2022 KOHSAKA Ryo, The University of Tokyo; - a Report on IUFRO OKINAWA 2022:  Progress in Small-scale Forestry beyond the Pandemic and Global Climate Change MAEDA Chiharu, University of Hyogo; - a Participation Report on the IUFRO Okinawa 2022 HAYAFUNE Masato, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute; - Participation Report on the IUFRO Conference Division 7 – Forest Health, Pathology and Entomology Lisbon 6-9 September 2022 NAKAMURA Katsunori, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute; - Report on Participation in the 5th International Conference on Radioecology & Environmental Radioactivity in 2022 KOMATSU Masabumi, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute; - Information of "XXVI IUFRO World Congress 2024"; and - a Notice from the Secretariat.

Visit:  https://www.iufro.org/discover/noticeboard/ 

Urban Forestry and Arboriculture in Malaysia:  An Interdisciplinary Research Perspective

This book was edited by Sreetheran Maruthaveeran, Wendy Y. Chen and Justin Morgenroth from IUFRO Research Group 6.07.00 - Urban forestry:  https://www.iufro.org/science/divisions/division-6/60000/60700/

It represents the latest research on urban forestry in a Malaysian context. It demonstrates that urban forestry is concerned not only with environmental enhancement, but also other aspects, such as recreation, health and well-being, and government policies. This book consists of 21 chapters.
View the Table of Contents:  https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-19-5418-4


Forest Adaptation and Restoration Under Global Change

Bolte, A., Mansourian, S., Madsen, P. et al. in Annals of Forest Science 80, 7 (2023).
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13595-022-01172-6
 
Along with the preservation of intact forest landscapes, forest adaptation and restoration are needed to prevent the continued global loss of ecosystem services and biodiversity, so that forest landscapes can meet the ecological, economic, and societal challenges due to global change.

Most of these papers in this collection result from collaborations in the global networks on Forest adaptation and restoration under global change, and the following one on Transforming forest landscapes for future climate and human well-being.

Both networks were constituted as IUFRO Task Forces (TF):  https://www.iufro.org/science/task-forces/


Finding Britain's 'Shadow Woods' Offers the Fastest Way to Reforest the Countryside

Article in The Conversation by Ian D. Rotherham (IUFRO officeholder), published on 25 January 2023:
https://theconversation.com/finding-britains-shadow-woods-offers-the-fastest-way-to-reforest-the-countryside-176934

Scouring the countryside reveals clues of ancient woods in plants, old maps, and soils. Ecologists call these remnants shadow woods. Shadow woods indicate the extent of a former woodland and where reforestation is most likely to succeed, with high levels of resulting biodiversity. That's because components of the former woodland are ready and waiting to aid the regeneration. Further reading:  Shadow Woods:  A Search for Lost Landscapes, https://www.ukeconet.org/store/p646/Shadow_Woods%3A_A_Search_for_Lost_Landscapes.html

Proceedings of the IUFRO 2019 Joint Conference Genetics of Five-Needle Pines and Rusts of Forest Trees
Prov. B.C., Victoria, B.C. Tech. Rep. 142.
Jodie Krakowski, Ward Strong, and Richard A. Sniezko (compilers)
The organizers of the 2019 IUFRO conference in Invermere, B.C. did an outstanding job developing an innovative and engaging program and field tours that highlighted current developments in research on and applications of genetics of five-needle pines and rusts of forest trees.
https://www.iufro.org/fileadmin/material/publications/proceedings-archive/20215-70205-invermere19.pdf

Parasitic Flowering Plants in Forests
Submission deadline:  6 March 2023

To showcase the breadth of research on parasitic flowering plants, this special issue of Botany welcomes submissions on (but not limited to):  conservation, anatomy, physiology, ecology, and management of unbalanced host-parasite relationships.

IUFRO Officeholders Luiza Teixeira-Costa, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium and David Watson, Charles Sturt University, Australia, are among the guest editors.
Details:  https://cdnsciencepub.com/topic/cjb-parasitic-flowering-plants-in-forests

The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 21 March the International Day of Forests (IDF) in 2012. The Day celebrates and raises awareness of the importance of all types of forests.

Watch the IDF 2023 video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUEsiXBUYzI&t=1s
Find more information, key messages and logos at:  https://www.fao.org/international-day-of-forests/en/