An approach to assess actors’ preferences and social learning to enhance participatory forest management planning

作者：Marlene Marques, Manuela Oliveira, José G. Borges · 发表于：Trees Forests and People · 年份：2020 · DOI：10.1016/j.tfp.2020.100026 · 被引用次数：27 · 研究领域：Forest Management and Policy、Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management、Sustainability and Climate Change Governance

Forest management planning is often challenged by the need to address contrasting preferences from several actors. Participatory approaches may help integrate actors’ preferences and demands and thus address this challenge. Workshops that encompass a participatory approach may further influence actors’ opinions and knowledge through social interaction and facilitate the development of collaborative landscape-level planning. Nevertheless, there is little experience of formal assessment of impacts of workshops with participatory approaches. This research addresses this gap. The emphasis is on the development of an approach (a) to quantify actors’ preferences for forest management models, post-fire management options, forest functions, and ecosystem services; (b) to assess the impact of participatory discussions on actors’ opinions; and (c) to evaluate the effect of social interaction on the actors’ learning and knowledge. The methodology involves a workshop with participatory approach, matched pre- and post-questionnaires, a non-parametric test, the Wilcoxon Signed-rank test for paired samples, and a self-evaluation questionnaire. We report results from an application to a joint forest management area in Vale do Sousa, in North-Western Portugal. Findings suggest that workshop and participatory discussions do contribute to social knowledge and learning about forest management models. Actors debated alternatives that can address their financial and wildfire risk-resistance concer...