Natural forest development as an aim within the National Strategy on Biological Diversity (NWE5)

Sub project: Evaluation of the nature conservation value of areas with natural forest development in Germany

Abstract

The biodiversity strategy of the German government is to have 5% of Germany’s forest developing naturally. The task of the research and development project, NWE5 is to produce a statement of account showing the current level and quality of naturally developing forests in Germany. This will then serve as the basis for the operationalization of the objectives in the National Biodiversity Strategy.

The contribution of the Institute of Silviculture is essentially to evaluate the nature conservation values of the areas with natural forest development (NWE) in Germany. First and foremost the protection status needs to be defined and evaluated. Furthermore, an overview of the criteria and indicators and the method used to combine them will be developed and to which nature conservation ratings can be applied. The central task will be the evaluation of individual areas, as well as the entire network of NWE area in Germany. For the evaluation of individual areas the criteria (eg, naturalness, rarity / endangeredness, habitat tradition) differ from those used for the evaluation of the network which are i.e. representativeness, complementarity and connectivity. The desired outcome is an evaluation of the quantity and quality of the area of forests with natural development.

Additional information:   www.nw-fva.nwe5