Abstract

Geoinforming the US Forest Service Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program
Track: Conservation
Authors: Bo Wilmer

Established by an act of Congress in 2009, the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP) encourages collaborative, science-based ecosystem restoration of priority forest landscapes. Since then, 23 CFLRP landscape-scale projects have been selected for funding.

A significant challenge for the CFLRP program is to take advantage of local collaborative groups' expertise to identify and implement restoration opportunities while also ensuring a consistent, systematic approach to prioritizing areas for treatment. Without a consistent approach to managing spatial data to inform restoration, best practices may be overlooked and restoration effectiveness is unmeasurable. So far, each project has taken a different approach to managing spatial data to inform priorities, set targets, and monitor accomplishments. This reflects the diversity of landscapes and constituent stakeholders in each collaborative. However, this also limits a consistent, scalable approach to highlight best practices for landscape restoration.

This presentation outlines some principles and examples for geo-enabling collaborative landscape restoration.