Climate change indicators for forests and forestry in Canada

Background/Question/Methods

The Canadian Forest Service is embarking on a five-year program to support climate change adaptation in the nation’s forest sector. This program consists of the accelerated documentation of impacts, the identification of selected indicators for monitoring, tracking systems for reporting on those impacts and indicators, and decision-support tools for assessing vulnerability and evaluating adaptation options. While existing and potential impacts are many, not all can be documented in terms of spatial extent and rates of change over time. Consequently, a few indicators are being selected for tracking based on the spatio-temporal extent of existing data, and on the feasibility, measurability, sensitivity (in responding to climate signals), and relevance with respect to forests and forestry in Canada. Workshops with researchers and policy experts were held in six cities across Canada to solicit suggestions for indicators of the effects of climate on forests, forest management, and forest communities. An environmental scan was also conducted, based primarily on articles published within the last decade and on worldwide web resources, to compile suggestions from the literature and to see what various agencies and institutions around the world (with an emphasis on boreal and temperate jurisdictions) are reporting in this regard. 

Results/Conclusions

Canadian Forest Service researchers nominated 146 indicators of forest change, reduced by one-quarter when duplicates and sub-sets were considered. The environmental scan identified >850 sources of proposed or anecdotal reports of climate change impacts on forest systems, but very few agencies or institutions provide systematic monitoring or mapping. A framework for classifying and evaluating indicators was devised, with proposed indicators grouped into climate drivers, those related to ecosystem structure and function, and socio-economic implications. Climate drivers include several specialized metrics or indices of relevance to forests, such as soil temperature, growing degree-days, and fire weather index. Ecosystem indicators include those addressing geomorphological and hydrological processes, edaphic conditions, biogeochemical cycling, natural disturbances and forest pests, species phenologies, stand dynamics (including regeneration, growth and mortality), and species distribution and abundance. Socio-economic indicators primarily related to forest management practices and policies, or to forest-dependent community attributes associated with forest use or economic importance. Conference participants will be given the opportunity to contribute their own observations and suggestions in a feedback portion of the poster. It is hoped that this initiative will provide the basis for collaborative monitoring and reporting among several Canadian agencies and institutions, and will be coordinated with similar international efforts.