Forest functions, ecosystem stability and management

Various socio-economic functions are ascribed to forests, based on the differentiated needs of the human population. Apart from the defined forest functions human welfare benefits from the diverse environmental effects of forests. The capacity of an ecosystem to sustain a specific function depends on the characteristics of its individual dynamics. Sustainable forest management concepts must take into account the: compatibility between forest function and ecosystem characteristics. Incompatibility causes either dysfunction and ecosystem degradation or the need of corrective management interventions which may exceed tolerable economic limits. A detailed understanding of the destabilising and stabilising processes intrinsic to the ecosystem is necessary, for their regulatory interactions, and their responses to exogenous disturbances and perturbations, which emerge from forest management and environmental conditions. The study of mechanisms involved in the dynamics of forest ecosystems and their sub-systems, the evaluation of these mechanisms in the light of forest ecosystem diversity, forest function and forest management, would help forestry to successfully cope with the obstacles arising from nature, changing environments and socio-economic forces. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.