What is Fordis?

Fordis is an interdisciplinary and international research group that seeks scientific solutions to protect existing carbon sequestration sinks and biodiversity in forests all over the world from an accelerated rate of devastation due to increasing susceptibility of forests to disturbance.
Contrary to public and scientific opinion, vast stretches of forest are particularly susceptible to disturbances and can thus be considered as potential carbon sources instead of carbon sinks! Since long-term planning is inherent and crucial to the forestry sector, managerial decisions must be made now in order to limit detrimental or even disastrous impacts on forest ecosystems and ultimately on our society.
Not only agriculture as such, but forestry in particular must seek unconventional solutions in order to protect our carbon sinks. The stewardship of our natural forest resources and implicitly the resulting silvicultural and management practices addressing climate change issues (e.g. “climatically adapted tree species”) reflect one of the primary tasks of our working group to protect our forests and to provide solutions for the establishment of resilient and sustainable forests.
The expert group Fordis will motivate and organize projects related to (a) analysis of ecological key functions and (b) risk assessment, to produce climate-adapted models for forest growth, disturbance dynamics, and risk stand predictions.

Fordis will function as a platform for all engaged and motivated scientists to develop and implement sustainable management practices for ecologically and socio-economically resilient forests as a means of storing carbon under changing environmental conditions. In this way, Fordis will strive to fill knowledge gaps identified by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Due to the concentration on sustainable land-use options, Fordis will support the goals of the United Nations Global Agenda for Forest and Climate Change and the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment. Increasing our understanding of disturbance and its effects will allow us to minimize or avoid the possible negative impacts on forestry, biodiversity, carbon sequestration, and the protection of natural resources.

Planned activities: literature synthesis, regular meeting and raising of funds for cooperative research work


Insect mass outbreak in Canada (British Columbia), Joan Westfall, Entopath Management Ltd. and from Kurz et al, 2008

Forest devastation due to fires, Source: US Forest Service