Communities filling gaps in forest stewardship, despite growing gaps in resources ft. Cecilia Danks

About

GundxChange

In these weekly talks, hosted by the Gund Institute for Environment, scholars and leaders exchange ("xChange") new research and solutions for people and planet.

This week, Rubenstein School for Environment and Natural Resources Associate Professor and Gund Faculty Fellow Cecilia Danks digs into the role of local communities in conserving and stewarding natural landscapes and resources is growing at a time when centralized government management of these critical resources is faltering. A brief overview of community-based forestry globally provides the historical context to understand U.S. versions, with a focus on New England’s town forests and community co-management in the fire-prone forests of the West. Cecilia will share findings from the first cohort of the Vermont town forest census and a case study of the new Trinity Headwaters Community Forest in California. Both involve public-private partnerships that require strong state and federal partners.

About the speaker: Cecilia Dank's research focuses on the intersection of community well-being and forest stewardship. Her work has addressed issues in community-based forestry, community-based forest enterprises, communities and carbon markets, forest certification, community-level socioeconomic monitoring, institutions for collaborative management, and the working forest. Cecilia is interested in institutional arrangements for community-based resource management, especially as they affect equity and sustainability in: climate change policies, community-based forestry, and forest carbon.