SFI Hosts Science Conference to Help Measure the Conservation Impact of Sustainable Forests

The Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) convened researchers, conservationists, academics and government officials from across North America this week for the first full-scale meeting of the SFI Sounding Board to provide guidance for the SFI Conservation Impact Project. This project, launched by SFI in September at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Conservation Congress, is a large-scale effort to quantify conservation benefits of well-managed forests stretching across North America from British Columbia to Florida. Forests certified to the SFI Forest Management Standard cover more than 280 million acres/113 million hectares. Millions more benefit from the SFI Fiber Sourcing Standard.

“There’s great value in having this group of experts come together to improve understanding of the cross-benefits of managed forests for water, biodiversity, and climate change mitigation,” said Dr. Che Elkin, Associate Professor of Ecosystem Science and Management at the University of Northern British Columbia, and a participant at the sounding board meeting.

The SFI Conservation Impact Project comprises a suite of projects that are conducting simultaneous investigations at a variety of scales. Researchers include grantees and partners of SFI’s Conservation and Community Partnership Grants Program, as well as other researchers with compatible interests. The project focuses on developing metrics for climate change mitigation, water quality and biodiversity, to encourage forest health, conservation and sound management, and to facilitate continual improvement.

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