Social Acceptability of Forest Management Systems at a Landscape Level

1
Social Acceptability of Forest Management Systems
at a Landscape Level

• Kathryn Williams
• School of Resource Management
• Ian Bishop
• Department of Geomatics
• University of Melbourne

2
Relevant Research History

• Williams
• environmental psychologist with expertise in
  social assessment of land use, environmental
  attitudes and values and environmental aesthetics
  
• Bishop
• leading researcher in the use of computer based
  technologies, including geographic information
  systems and virtual environments. He has
  pioneered the use of these technologies to
  explore human perception of the landscape.

Williams, K.J.H., Nettle, R. Petheram, J.
(2003). Public response to plantation forestry
on farms. Australian Forestry, 66 (2), pp.93-99
Williams, K.J.H (2002). Beliefs about natural
forest systems. Australian Forestry, 65 (2), pp.
81-86. Williams, K.J.H. Cary, J.W. (2002)
Landscape preference, ecological quality and
biodiversity protection. Environment and
Behavior, 34 (2), 258-275. Williams, K.J.H.,
Cary, J.W Webb, T. (2001). Social research
priorities for forest management. TasForests, 13
(2), 303-307. Williams, K.J.H. Harvey, D.H.P.
(2001). Transcendent experience in forest
environments. Journal of Environmental
Psychology, 21 (3), pp. 249-260.
Bishop, I.D., Hull, R.B. and Stock, C. (in press)
Supporting personal world-views in an envisioning
system, Environmental Modelling and Software.
Bishop, I.D., Ford, R., Loiterton, D. and
Williams, K. (in press) Studying the
acceptability of forest management practices
using visual simulation of forest regrowth in
Visualization in Landscape and Environmental
Planning. I. D. Bishop and E. Lange (eds).
London, SPON. Bishop, I. D., Rohrmann, B.
(2003). Subjective responses to simulated and
real environments a comparison. Landscape and
Urban Planning 65, 261-277. Bishop, I. D.,
Wherrett, J.R. and Miller, D.R. (2001).
Assessment of path choices on a country walk
using a virtual environment. Landscape and Urban
Planning, 52, 227-239. Bishop, I. D., Ye, W.-S.,
Karadaglis, C. (2001). Experiential approaches
to perception response in virtual worlds.
Landscape and Urban Planning, 54,119-127.
3

Current Project Background Social acceptability
of forest management systems

• Relative acceptability of forest management
  systems
• Acceptability of systems immediately after
  harvest and over (animated) cycle
• Relation between values, beliefs, affiliation and
  acceptability judgments
• Effect of information on judgments

4
Public response to forest management

• Scenic Beauty 1960s onwards
• Scenic beauty estimation method (eg Daniel and
  Boster 1976, Williamson and Chalmers 1982)
• Focus on visual impacts of harvesting
• Acceptability 1990s onward
• Broader and more complex concept drawing on
  peoples values, knowledge and experience (eg
  Ribe 1999)
• Acknowledges people may accept unattractive
  outcomes where they see environmental, economic
  or other benefit
• Stimulus may or may not include visual images
•  

5
Methods

• Preliminary field interviews
• 18 people in four affiliations
• Information to assist in development of research
  tools
• Main study
• Quasi-experimental design, individual
  questionnaire
• 551 people recruited through community and
  industry organisations
• 153 affiliated with conservation organisations
• 341 non-affiliated
• 57 affiliated with large scale timber industry
• 64 group sessions in Hobart, Huon Valley and
  Burnie
• 12 individual interviews

6
Methods Group sessions
7
Questionnaire

• Acceptability of clearfelling and alternative
  systems
• 1very unacceptable 7 very acceptable
• Held values and preferred aims of forest
  management
• Intrinsic, use and non-use values regarding
  nature
• Importance of 10 valued aims/outcomes eg. animal
  habitat, old growth trees, productivity and
  income, eucalypt regrowth trees for timber
• Beliefs about consequences of clearfell systems
• Agreement with 20 statements regarding
  consequences of clearfelling

8
Acceptability judgements
9
Proposed research background

• Research to date focuses on stand/coupe level and
  leaves several gaps in understanding of
  acceptable forest management

• Intensity and distribution of alternative forest
  management systems
• Spatial relationships with forest types (eg.
  old-growth, re-growth) and land use types
  (wilderness, tourism, settlement)

10
Project will examine

• Relative acceptability of forest management
  systems and patterns when costs and benefits are
  presented on a landscape level
• Spatial relationships and acceptability FMS -
  proximity and intensity of harvest in relation to
  forest type (eg. old-growth, re-growth and
  plantation forests) and land use (eg.
  settlements, tourism and agriculture)
• Development of interactive visualization
  technology for understanding social assessment of
  land management options

11
Methods

• Participants conservation forestry affiliates,
  local residents, tourists
• Focus on actual (and/or hypothetical) forest area
• Development of interactive visualisation system
• 2-stage validity testing of interactive and
  pre-set visualisations
• Development of non-inferior scenarios covering
  range of stakeholder views and preferences
• Interviews based on interactive systems to
  examine preferred outcomes at landscape level
  (n75)
• Survey of Tasmanian residents (n400) to examine
  relative acceptability of systems at landscape
  level

12
Interactive Visualisation A

• based on existing software
• links GIS with 3D views
• reduced fidelity to provide full interactivity

13
Interactive Visualisation - B

• single user
• high quality graphics
• constrained interactivity
• stand alone, CD or web-based

14
Visualisation - C

• Multiple Users/Respondents
• High Fidelity
• Stills
• Groups Stills
• Animations
• Immersive Option
• Theatre, Web or CD based

15
Analysis

• Determination of findings relating to
• Landscape level trade-offs between forest
  management outcomes
• Variation in preferences within interest groups
  and broad community
• Assessment of the effectiveness of the
  visualisation and preference input procedures
• Recommendations for wider use of developed
  systems and understanding

16
Timeline

• Stage 1 (2005-2006) Development of interactive
  GIS, visualisation (A/B) and survey tools
• Stage 2 (2006-2007) Scenario development and
  visualisation (B/C)
• Stage 3 (2007-2008) Public evaluation, analysis
  and reporting

17
Budget Expenditure

• 26 - 85K p.a.
• 26K p.a.
• 12 - 20K p.a.
• 12K p.a.
• 6K p.a.
• 8K p.a.

• Overall cash budget sought 78 - 152K p.a.
• Personnel
• Either Research Fellow or PhD student on social
  science side
• PhD student on technical side
• Research Assistance
• Travel
• Incentives
• Minor Equipment/Data/Software

18
Budget Income

• Cash Total 78 - 152K
• ARC contribution would be 62 - 122K
• Industry cash contribution is gt 20 of ARC
  contribution, i.e. 16 - 30K p.a
• Industry in-kind must make total equal to ARC
  contribution i.e. 46 - 92K, e.g.
• Time of personnel (e.g.
• Use of equipment, facilities
• Travel
• Data (cost of provision)

19
Proposal timetable

• internal closing date November 1
• ARC closing date November 26
• announcements May 2005
• project commencement October 2005
• project partner meetings
• Approx 6 monthly, first meeting Hobart Nov 2005
• Later meeting in Melbourne or Hobart depending on
  developments to be reviewed and intersecting
  travel plans
• Use of telephone conferencing as required