Past EFICEEC Projects

EFICEEC has worked on, or been associated, with the following concluded projects: 

Natura 2000 and forests – assessing the state of implementation and effectiveness

European Forest Institute, 2016-2017

Purpose of the study is to prepare a publication on “Implementation of Natura 2000 in forests“ in the EFI series "What Science Can Tell Us". Rationale of the study: collection of key facts about the importance of forests for Natura 2000 and vice versa; document the high stakes and challenges to integrate Natura 2000/nature conservation with for-estry/land-use; and the pressing needs to synthesize available, but scattered state-of-the-art knowledge to inform policymaking and to identify and address existing knowledge gaps.

More information available here. 

STARTREE - Multipurpose trees and non-wood forest products a challenge and opportunity

StarTree aims to provide better understanding, knowledge, guidance and tools to support stakeholders in optimising the management of multi-purpose trees and developing innovative approaches for increasing the marketability and profitability of NWFP for a more competitive rural economy. StarTree will achieve this by: (i) developing new knowledge and tools to optimise the sustainable and joint provision of wood, NWFP and related services as well as the management of multi-purpose trees in a climate change context, (ii) advancing the understanding on the socio-economic importance and the potentials of markets for NWFP, including the role of public and private actors in supporting the innovation processes for new products and services based on consumers´ behaviours and patterns, and (iii) establishing solid strategic partnerships between key research organizations and specialised small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) working on NWFP in Europe to ensure and speed up the transfer of research and innovations to markets 

Project is funded by the European Union through the Europeann Commission's FP7 Cooperation Work Programme. 

More information available via: http://star-tree.eu/ 

FACESMAP (Forest Land Ownership Change in Europe: Significance for Management and Policy)

Forest ownership is changing across Europe. In some areas a growing number of so-called “new” forest owners hold only small parcels, have no agricultural or forestry knowledge and no capacities or interest to manage their forests, while in others new community and private owners are bringing fresh interest and new objectives to woodland management. This diversity and change creates implementation problems for forest-related policies including biodiversity conservation, timber and renewable energy supply, climate change mitigation, or recreation. The objectives of FACESMAP are: (i) to analyse attitudes and constraints of different forest owner types in Europe and the on-going changes, (ii) to explore innovative management approaches for new forest owner types, (iii) to study effective policy instruments with a comparative analysis approach and (iv) to draw conclusions and recommendations for forest-related policies, forest management practice, further education and future research. These objectives will be addressed by themes organized around three working groups (WGs): WG 1: Forest ownership types and motives, WG 2: New forest management approaches and WG 3: Forest owner related policies. 

More information available via:   http://facesmap.boku.ac.at/ 

Visions of Land Use Transitions in Europe

The overall project aim is to inform European policy and land management about the bandwidth of critical pathways for multifunctional and sustainable land use. Land management and policy options will be identified in time and in space and their consequences will be evaluated in terms of the provisioning of ecosystem and biodiversity services. The project will contribute to development of decision-support tools with trade-off evaluation methods based on EFISCEN resource projections, which will be integrated into the ToSIA tool framework. 

More information available via:   http://www.volante-project.eu/ 

INTEGRAL - Future-oriented integrated management of European forest landscapes

Integration of nature protection in forest management and its relation to other forest functions/services: The Integral Project. 

EFISEE and its partners are participating by making research and case studies within two SEE countries; Croatia and Serbia. 

More information available here:  http://www.integral-project.eu/ 

The issue of participation in sustainability indicator processes has been pointed out as crucial aspect as norm creation and knowledge production is done. The non-involvement of citizens and lay persons limits the value of the sustainability indicators as local knowledge and practices cannot be accounted for. Knowledge gets lost.

We assume that the opening up of such processes to citizens and lay persons does not only increase legitimacy and accuracy of indicators, but also enhances public awareness for the sustainability topic. The proposed research project aims at improving the sustainability indicator selection, definition and evaluation through the involvement of lay persons and concerned citizen by the application multi-criteria analysis. This is done in an experimental setting simulating a sustainability indicator process during two research seminars designed for students.

More information available here.

ARANGE - Advanced multifunctional forest management in European mountain ranges

ARANGE is a collaborative project within FP7 (Theme KBB.2011.1.2-07) with the aim to provide improved insight in the multifunctional management of European mountain forests. ARANGE will evaluate the capacity of current forest management regimes and possible alternative future management to provide portfolios of ecosystem services (ES) from mountain forests. The project includes a wide range of forest types in the major European mountain ranges and seeks to develop and evaluate strategies for their multifunctional management under risk and uncertainty due to changing climate and socio-economic conditions. 

The consortium comprises in total 16 partner institutions from 11 countries and the European Forest Institute (EFI) as an international partner, coordinating institution is the Institute of Silviculture, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU). 

 More information available via:   http://www.arange-project.eu/ 

	ThinkForest - A European high-level forum on the future of forests
German Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV), Finish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (mmm.fi), Swedish Ministry for Rural Affairs, 2012-2013

ThinkForest provides: A unique science-policy interface and An inspiring and dynamic science-policy dialogue. ThinkForest works to identify information needs related to forest policy questions and build a common understanding of the problems at hand. By helping policy makers navigate through the wealth of information on offer and providing them with the best available expertise and the latest research-based information it enables informed decision making on strategic forest issues. 

More information available via:  http://www.thinkforest.efi.int/portal/

	C&I for SFM - Implementing Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management in Europe
German Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV), 2011 - 2013

The project will provide an objective review of the achievements of the pan-European Criteria and Indicators for Sustainable Forest Management (CI-SFM), and of how they have been implemented at the European, national and local levels and in sectors other than forestry. The project will also identify challenges and develop recommendations for improving the C&I set and their further development and implementation in an evolving international environment – in consideration of European and national level needs. 

The project is coordinated by the European Forest Institute (EFI), and is conducted in close cooperation with FOREST EUROPE Liaison Unit Madrid, UNECE/FAO, and METLA.

More information available via http://ci-sfm.org/

Action E51: Integrating Innovation and Development Policies for the Forest Sector

Innovation policies as well as entrepreneurship related policies are a key pillar of the EU "Lisbon Strategy", the economic development policy of the EU endorsed in March 2000. In a forest policy context, the MCPFE (Ministerial Conference on the Protection of Forests in Europe) has recently adopted the Vienna Resolution on the “Economic Viability of Sustainable Forest Management calling for the strengthening of innovation and entrepreneurship in this sector. The main objective of COST E51 was to develop knowledge that enables integration of innovation and development policies for a more effective and sustainable development of the forest sector.

More information available here: http://www.boku.ac.at/coste51/ 

	Sustainable forest management providing renewable energy, sustainable construction and bio-based products
FP7-REGIONS-2009, as part of EFI in a consortium, 2010-2012

RoK-FOR aims to create a ‘region of knowledge’ in the forestry sector in Europe, and will significantly contribute to forest sector supporting sustainable use of natural resources, renewable energy, sustainable construction materials and biobased products, without jeopardizing the environment. RoK-FOR is a Coordination Action of five regional research-driven clusters from six European countries: Germany (Baden-Württemberg); Finland (North Karelia); Spain (Catalonia), and the cross-border clusters from Croatia-Serbia and France-Spain (Aquitaine-Basque). These regional research-driven clusters collectively form a European level meta-cluster that will be working together to increase the coherence and address the needs of the three Lead Market Initiatives (renewable energy, sustainable construction, and bio-based products) under the umbrella of the sustainable forest management in an innovative and competitive manner.

More information available via:  http://www.rokfor.eu/

	Wood in Carbon Efficient Construction
WoodWisdomNet, Österreichische Forschungsförderungsgesellschaft FFG, 2010-2013

The project is part of a scientific cooperation in the framework of the ERA-net Programme WoodWisdomNet. The Austrian part is financed by FFG and the Association of Austrian Timber Industry in der project “EcoTimber”. The main objectives of ECO2 are (i) to create a holistic understanding of carbon efficiency in the full life-cycle of a building, (ii) to define the technical potential and obstacles for the use of wood in carbon efficient construction, (iii) to develop practical solutions for calculating and optimising the carbon footprint of different wood construction systems, and (iv) to disseminate the scientific results efficiently to relevant stakeholders, including e.g. authorities, regulation developers and construction industry. BOKU is mainly responsible for objective iv. The work is based on an innovation system analysis which will identify relevant target groups and their information needs. The work will then assess and select suitable communication and dissemination tools and strategies.

More information available via http://www.eco2wood.com/