Philosophy
“Comprehend and copy nature.”
(Viktor Schauberger)
“Nature is a totally efficient, self-regenerating system. If we discover the laws that govern this system and live synergistically within them, sustainability will follow and humankind will be a success.”
(Buckminster Fuller)
“With any given phenomenon in nature — and especially if it is significant or striking — we should not stop and dwell on it, cling to it, and view it as existing in isolation. Instead we should look about in the whole of nature to find where there is something related. For only when related elements are drawn together will a whole gradually emerge that speaks for itself and requires no further explanation.”
(Johann Goethe)
Holistic Forestry is an ecological design science approach to natural resource management.
A mature forest is the most stabilizing, regenerative, and resiliency-building cover type on the earth. Forest cover is crucial for the purification and proper cycling of our water resources, the creation of healthy soil ecologies which drive carbon sequestration, and the production of essential resources for society to flourish.
As natural resource professionals seek reliable strategies and frameworks for the sustainable management of our global forest resources, a myriad of “alternative silvicultural approaches” have been developed around the world.
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Source
(Puettmann, K.J., Wilson, S.M., Baker, S.C. et al. Silvicultural alternatives to conventional even-aged forest management - what limits global adoption?. For. Ecosyst. 2, 8 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40663-015-0031-x)
The proliferation of these distinct, but similar, approaches to forestry, is a response to the limitations of conventional top-down approaches to forest management. Global case-studies suggest that for forest management to be sustainable on a landscape-level, local stewards must be equipped to facilitate their own management processes.
Toward a Natural Resource Facilitation
Holistic Forestry (HF) is unique from other approaches to forest management, because it emphasizes design thinking as a vehicle for adaptive management processes. Instead of focusing on the management and control of the individual parts of an ecosystem, HF focuses on the facilitation and guidance of ecological processes and interrelationships.
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The holistic forester is a pragmatist, an ecological design scientist, and the facilitator of design thinking processes in natural resource management. This is a process that can be translated to all natural resource management scenarios.
Design thinking can be summed up in the following points:
1) Understand/Empathize First understand the whole of the context and empathize with all relevant parties (plants, people, animals, etc). Investigate the history of the situation and acquire all pertinent information. Determine if the overarching narrative is grounded or needs adjustment.
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2) Define Analyze the collected information, and identify objectives, values, goals, inputs, outputs, skill sets, budgets, etc. of the relevant parties. Determine points of strength and weakness in the system & context being considered.
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3) Ideate Diverge on a large quantity of potential approaches, technologies, and methods that could become future solutions.
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4) Prototype: Select and develop representations of the best ideas. Create testable and tangible products, plans, and experiments.
5) Test: Implement the product, plan or process, evaluate its practical effects, and integrate feedback from the system over time. Continue refining the product, plan, or process to optimize its quality.
In a never ending conversation with Nature, the questions we pose through management activities are answered with feedback from the whole ecosystem. It is only through protracted and involved observation that stewards become equipped to facilitate this living dialogue, devising strategies that sustain humans and nature in perpetuity.