Forestry - European observatory of climate change impacts and demonstration network of climate smart restoration pilots

A holistic approach is needed to ensure that climate, biodiversity and bioeconomy goals can be integrated at different scales in practice and with the engagement of local communities, forest owners and industries. Intensive monitoring of impacts and sharing of experiences in the context of climate change is an important decision support at the science-practice interface to implement adapted forest management practices successfully.

Proposals will:

• Establish a European network to gather information on current developments in demo and long-term observation sites;
• Reinitiate EU participation in the International Co-operative Programme on the Assessment and Monitoring of Air Pollution Effects on Forests (ICP Forests) for long-term observations of forest ecosystems;
• Develop an evidence-based overview on current and planned forest restoration activities across Europe and their socio-economic and environmental impacts;
• Quantify possible synergies and trade-offs between contrasting forest management objectives at different spatial, temporal scales in different social environmental contexts in Europe;
• Analyse typical restoration cases to systematise knowledge on implementation successes and failures in specific regional settings, and distil best practices cases and business models for upscaling;
• Engage with key stakeholders and citizens to develop regionalised restoration trajectories through assessment of regional restoration pathways;
• Consider forward-looking forest conversion through adaptive forest management to mitigate/prevent future adverse effects;
• Improve communication and network/capacity building and exchange of experience, engagement with key stakeholders including national and regional policymakers and enable knowledge exchange beyond the forest community;
• Pilot climate-smart forestry measures and support forest restoration of damaged areas and degraded ecosystems in view of the diverse forest conditions, value chains and societal needs found across Europe.

Proposals may involve financial support to third parties, particularly for setting up of the observatory and for supporting the implementation and scaling-up of climate-smart restoration pilots. All European climate/biogeographical regions should be covered.

In order to achieve the expected outcomes, international cooperation is strongly encouraged.

The involvement of citizens and civil society in co-creating solutions (e.g. as part of user-led innovation or citizen science), alongside other actors, is encouraged as part of the project’s methodology / approach.

Proposals should include a task to collaborate with other projects financed under the topics HORIZON-CL6-2021-CLIMATE-01-09: Enhancing science-based knowledge on EU forests’, including old-growth forests, capacities to mitigate climate change and associated risks and HORIZON-CL6-2021-CLIMATE-01-10: EU-China international cooperation on increasing the resilience of forests.

Projects should consider to collaborate with the EU Observatory on Deforestation and Forest Degradation, managed by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission.

In this topic the integration of the gender dimension (sex and gender analysis) in research and innovation content is not a mandatory requirement.