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- Title
Impacts of Forest Management‐Induced Productivity Changes on Future Land Use and Land Cover Change.
- Authors
Luo, Meng; Daigneault, Adam; Zhao, Xin; Hao, Dalei; Chen, Min
- Abstract
Anthropogenic land use and land cover change (LULCC) is projected to continue in the future. However, the influence of forest management on forest productivity change and subsequent LULCC projections remains under‐investigated. This study explored the impacts of forest management‐induced change in forest productivity on LULCC throughout the 21st century. Specifically, we developed a framework to softly couple the Global Change Analysis Model and Global Timber Model to consider forest management‐induced forest productivity change and projected future LULCC across the five Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). We found future increases in forest management intensity overall drive the increase of forest productivity. The forest management‐induced forest productivity change shows diverse responses across all SSPs, with a global increase from 2015 to 2100 ranging from 3.9% (SSP3) to 8.8% (SSP1). This further leads to an overall decrease in the total area with a change of land use types, with the largest decrease under SSP1 (−7.5%) and the smallest decrease under SSP3 (−0.7%) in 2100. Among land use types, considering forest management‐induced change significantly reduces the expansion of managed forest and also reduces the loss of natural land in 2100 across SSPs. This suggests that ignoring forest management‐induced forest productivity change underestimates the efficiency of wood production, overestimates the managed forest expansion required to meet the future demand, and consequently, potentially introduces uncertainties into relevant analyses, for example, carbon cycle and biodiversity. Thus, we advocate to better account for the impacts of forest management in future LULCC projections. Plain Language Summary: Land use and land cover change has shown widespread social, economic, and environmental impacts. However, the influence of forest management on forest productivity change and subsequent land use and land cover change projections remains under‐investigated. This study explored how changes in forest productivity caused by forest management practices impact land use and land cover throughout the 21st century under various social and economic scenarios. The results show that more intense forest management generally leads to more productive forests. This, in turn, results in smaller changes in land use and land cover. Increasing forest management reduces the need to expand managed forests and helps preserve natural lands by 2100. Ignoring the impact of forest management on forest productivity could lead to biases in projecting forest expansion and wood production and potentially induce uncertainties in carbon cycling and biodiversity. Our results emphasize the need to account for forest management in future projections of land use and land cover changes. Key Points: Forest management‐induced productivity change has a significant impact on future land use and land cover change (LULCC)Neglecting such impact could overestimate the managed forest expansion and natural land reduction, especially under SSP1 and SSP5We advocate considering such impacts during LULCC projection to constrain the uncertainty
- Subjects
LAND cover; LAND use; FOREST management; CARBON cycle; FOREST reserves; FOREST biodiversity
- Publication
Earth's Future, 2024, Vol 12, Issue 8, p1
- ISSN
2328-4277
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1029/2024EF004878