The increasing frequency of forest fires in Europe underlines the importance of climate-resilient forests. As part of the OptFor-EU research project funded by the European Commission, forest managers in eight European case study regions were surveyed on the management practices and ecosystem services of the forests they manage.
Hermine Mitter presented the motivations of forest managers to adapt their forests to climate change at the congress of the Austrian Society for Sociology in Graz on July 1, 2025 and at the congress of the European Society for Rural Sociology in Riga on July 8, 2025. She addressed the obstacles that forest managers face in this long-term and challenging task and what ecosystem services their forests should and can provide now and in the future.
The initial results show that a high level of risk awareness does not automatically lead to those responsible making adjustments in their forests. Perceived self-efficacy appears to be decisive for the formation of adaptation intentions, whereas regulations significantly restrict the options for action of forest managers, thereby delaying or even preventing the implementation of adaptation measures.