The Swiss forest must adapt to climate change

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“The kind of forests we know will soon be gone. Climate change is visible in many places,” says FOEN director Katrin Schneeberger. “The spruce, the symbol of the Jurassic arc, will probably largely disappear from the Central Plateau because it is too hot there.”

The FOEN held the media conference together with the Canton of Jura and the Conference for Forests, Nature and Landscape (KWL) in a forest in the Ajoie, which is particularly affected by extreme events.

In recent years, droughts, heat waves, storms and late frosts have weakened trees in Swiss forests and made them more susceptible to disease and insect infestations, according to the FOEN. Collaboration between the federal government and the cantons is essential to guide this process and maintain a flexible ecosystem.

For the FOEN director, the pace of climate change exceeds the natural adaptive capacity of the forest ecosystem. “It’s up to us humans to step in and help him adapt,” Schneeberger confirmed.

In cooperation with the federal government, the cantons have identified three areas of action, as Stefan Müller, district president of Appenzell Innerrhoden, explains. It is about enabling viable forest regeneration, preserving the stability of climate-sensitive tree species and ensuring the safety of forest users.

For David Eray, director of Jurassic Environment, the challenge now is managing the transition to forests adapted to a warmer, drier climate. “This transition is only possible through modern forest management, forestry measures and the commitment of forest owners and professionals,” said Eray.

“Since 2019, you can see in the Jura as in a living laboratory how strongly and how quickly climate change affects and changes the forest, but also how much it questions many practices,” says the environmental director.

The forests in the Jura, especially in the Ajoie, are suffering from climate change. The accumulation of extreme events had dramatic consequences in the canton as hundreds of hectares of beech forest died in 2019. At that time, the Jurassic government declared the state of a cantonal forest disaster.

Work was done to secure roads threatened by falling trees and government agencies also had to reforest damaged forests.

(SDA)

Source:Blick