Hutton climate change research featured in high-profile publications

“The Report Card outlines the possible effects of future climate change, focussing on threats and opportunities relevant to crop, livestock, wood and other production in the agriculture and forestry sectors.

Climate change and forestry research from James Hutton Institute scientists has been featured in two influential publications: Forestry for a low-carbon future – integrating forests and wood products in climate change strategies, edited by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the Agriculture and Forestry Climate Change Impacts Report Card 2016, published by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Living With Environmental Change (LWEC) Network.

The FAO publication looks at climate change mitigation using forestry, whereas the Report Card examines the impact of climate change on agriculture and forestry in the UK.

The FAO paper was launched last month at the organisation’s headquarters in Rome, Italy, as part of the Committee on Forestry (COFO) biennial session held during World Forest Week. The publication is the final product of the project “The economics of forest climate change mitigation options”, a collaborative effort from 113 forestry and climate change experts including Professor Maria Nijnik, a senior researcher at the James Hutton Institute’s Social, Economic and Geographical Sciences in Aberdeen.

Professor Robin Matthews, research leader at the James Hutton Institute in Aberdeen, co-led an expert panel responsible for the Agriculture and Forestry Climate Change Impacts Report Card, which also included colleagues from the Institute’s Dundee site. The publication offers an overview of how climate change is affecting agriculture and forestry in the UK, and how it might affect these two types of land use in future.

Professor Matthews commented: “The report card summarises the major changes that have occurred in these sectors in recent decades, including some that can be attributed to climate change.

“It also outlines the possible effects of future climate change, focussing on threats and opportunities relevant to crop, livestock, wood and other production in the agriculture and forestry sectors.”

The paper Forestry for a low-carbon future – integrating forests and wood products in climate change strategies is available for download from the FAO website, as is the Agriculture and Forestry Climate Change Impacts Report Card from the NERC website.