Re-Imagining Nature Communication: The Role of Societal Values for Forest Ecosystem Services
29 Pages Posted: 26 Nov 2021
Abstract
Forests are increasingly vulnerable to climate change and biodiversity loss, but the aim to achieve net zero greenhouse emissions will trigger increased forest use in the future, enforcing different viewpoints about the right course of action. Analysing new survey data from five countries in Europe we found that citizens’ environmental orientation is the most significant factor in predicting preferences towards forest ecosystem services. Our results also show that personal values are significant in predicting the sample group’s environmental orientation contrary to socio-demographic factors. If therefore decision-makers continue to impose culturally specific values failing to acknowledge that citizens have varied environmental orientations guided by personal values, this will impact the acceptance of forest-related decision-making. Improving the understanding of societal values and preferences for specific ecosystem services among citizens should be seen as a pre-condition for being able to effectively tackle and manage value-based trade-offs and synergies in forests.
Keywords: Societal values, environmental orientations, forest ecosystem services, citizens perceptions
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