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Public Perceptions and Acceptance of Intensive Forestry in Sweden

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Abstract

The use of intensive forestry on part of the forested area in Sweden increases the production of forest biomass and enables an increased use of such biomass to mitigate climate change. However, with increasing conflicting interests in forests and forestry, the success of such a strategy depends on the public acceptance. In this paper, the results of a mail survey show that although a majority of the general public in Sweden supports measures to increase forest growth, they oppose the use of intensive forestry practices such as the cultivation of exotic tree species, clones, and forest fertilization. The acceptance of such practices is mainly influenced by the perceptions of their environmental consequences. Public acceptance was highest for forest fertilization, whereas clone cultivation was the least accepted practice.

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Notes

  1. Although the model Chi square (χ 2) should be non-significant, it was significant (χ 2 = 42.242, p = 0.009, N = 266, df = 23). However, the χ 2 was less than two times the model’s degrees of freedom, which roughly indicates a good model fit (Tabachnick and Fidell 2006). The goodness-of-fit indices (Schreiber et al. 2006) also indicated a good model fit (the normed fit index, incremental fit index, Tucker–Lewis index and comparative fit index were greater than 0.95 and the root mean square error of approximation was less than 0.06).

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Acknowledgments

The financial support of the European Union, the county administrative board of Jämtland, Sveaskog, SCA Forest Products, Norrskog, and Jämtkraft is acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Linnaeus University, 351 95, Växjö, Sweden

    Kerstin Hemström, Krushna Mahapatra & Leif Gustavsson

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  1. Kerstin Hemström
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  2. Krushna Mahapatra
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  3. Leif Gustavsson
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Correspondence to Kerstin Hemström.

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Hemström, K., Mahapatra, K. & Gustavsson, L. Public Perceptions and Acceptance of Intensive Forestry in Sweden. AMBIO 43, 196–206 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-013-0411-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-013-0411-9

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