Thought Piece Explores Options To Incent Reforestation
U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities, Greenville, SCFor IMMEDIATE RELEASE (June 15, 2015)
In a recent meeting between leaders of the U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities (Endowment) and the USDA Forest Service, Region 8 (USFS) — the southern U.S.—no one was surprised when the conversation turned to the twin issues of “keeping forests as forests” and reforestation – putting land back into active forest management after a timber harvest. In a nation where the bulk of forests are privately owned (56%) and where the lion’s share of the private slice (62%) is owned by families, the threats of conversion to non-forest uses or to forgo reforestation after harvest, are growing.
Federal and state forestry agencies and the forest products companies that depend upon those lands for almost all of their raw materials have for decades debated approaches designed to encourage reforestation.
“We are fortunate many states have special incentives to encourage reforestation that can be paired with those offered at the federal level – both favorable taxation of financial gains from a long-term investment and direct cost-share programs to help address the high initial costs and long timeframes before seeing areturn,” said Endowment President Carlton Owen. “Sadly, too few owners except those who own substantial acreages take advantage of the tools available. And even more, the pools of cost-share funds are limited; thus, many who apply are not able to obtain support.”
To shed additional light on use of currently available tools and the potential of low-interest loans as a new approach, Owen called on Clemson University forest economist Dr. Tom Straka for his thoughts. “Any scientist will go over the literature first, as reinventing the wheel is unnecessary,” says Straka. “I spent thebetter part of a weekend digging into what has been done and then thinking about the ideas that the Endowment and Forest Service folks put forward.”
Straka’s discussion paper, as he calls it, is entitled “Loans for Reforestation: Family Forest Owners and Timber Supply.” Ken Arney, Deputy Regional Foresters for State & Private Forest Programs in Atlanta, says, “Tom does a great job of summarizing some very complex variables and vehicles that have been usedin the past as well as exploring the idea of loans that came from our brainstorming session.”
Perhaps the greatest learnings come in two areas that both the Endowment and USFS will explore further as each could be strategic to on-going collaboration in a project to advance sustainable forestry and land retention among African American forestland owners. First, Straka’s review of the literature suggests that black landowners might be more amenable to the idea of loans to address reforestation needs than is the general population. And then as Straka posits, “The real place to have an impact on family forestrestoration is to focus on financial mechanisms, harvesting/reforestation technology and forestmanagement systems designed for small forest holdings.”
In short, as family income levels increase and as size of ownership grows, forestland owners are more likely to be intentional about retention and forest management. Unfortunately, ownership size is rapidly trending downward with more than 60 percent of the 11 million families that own forestlands holdingparcels of less than 10 acres. “Clearly the challenges of keeping forests as forests for all of their societal and environmental benefits and of seeing those lands reforested to meet the needs of America’s forestproducts industry and all who love and benefit from forests, are getting more challenging,” says Owen.
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For more information contact:
Carlton N. Owen, President & CEO, 864-233-7646, carlton@runslikeclock.work
The U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities (the Endowment) is a not-for-profit public charity working collaboratively with partners in the public and private sectors to advance systemic,transformative, and sustainable change for the health and vitality of the nation’s working forests andforest-reliant communities – www.usendowment.org
