UTOPIA – Is climate smart forestry a utopia if the preferences of landowners are not considered?

UTOPIA – Is climate smart forestry a utopia if the preferences of landowners are not considered? The objective of the UTOPIA project is to develop methods to support stakeholders in implementing climate smart forestry, which advances carbon neutrality but also considers financial objectives. In the analysis, a landscape is composed of holdings and holdings are composed of stands. Holdings have typically different owners that have different preferences about what kind of management is practiced in their stands. We focus on supporting decision making in this setting and finding the most preferred solution among multiple conflicting objectives. University of Eastern Finland is in charge of the Work Package 2, aiming to identify to what extent the private ownership constrains climate smart forestry at the landscape-level, and to develop support solutions that produce climate benefits through negotiations between landowners. The project is funded by the Research Council of Finland and implemented in the Natural Resources Institute Finland, University of Eastern Finland and University of Jyväskylä.