Box 23A Data availability and country groupings

There are various definitions of what constitutes forest; in this report data on forest usually refer to any land area with a tree crown cover (a measure of tree density) of more than about 20 per cent of the ground area with trees growing to more than about 7 metres in height and able to produce wood (UNECE/FAO, 1992a); whenever no such data are available, 'forest and wooded land' is used ­ a broader term which also includes open woodland, scrub, shrub and brushland. The term 'forestry', as used in this chapter, is taken to include all human activities (not just those associated with wood production) relating to the management of forests for whatever purpose.

A reasonable amount of data available for Western Europe on forests (eg, UNECE/FAO, 1992 a; b; c; CEC/UNECE, 1993, and Eurostat). However, the vast majority relate to factors important to the management of forests for timber production. This includes such measurements as: area by broad forest type (coniferous versus broadleaved), rates of reforestation and afforestation, volumes of the standing stock of wood and annual growth, annual fellings and removals. Since the UNECE and CEC merged their datasets on forest condition in Europe in 1991, comparable information on
90 000 trees and 4400 plots has been made available every year on defoliation, discoloration and species (from 1993, additional data on soil and foliar analyses, deposition measurements and increment studies have been collected). Data are also available on economic aspects, but again these relate almost wholly to physical measures of production and trade of wood-derived products such as roundwood, pulp and charcoal. Accurate data are generally lacking on such factors as:

• the area of forest subject to harvesting practices such as large-scale clear felling and the use of heavy machinery, and the area of forest grown specifically for pulp production;
• the extent and rate of afforestation with monoculture stands;
• the extent and rate of planting of introduced tree species (exotic trees);
• the amount of ancient/natural forest remaining;
• the extent to which forests are used for non-wood production purposes such as recreation (visitor frequency), hunting and conservation;
• employment trends.

The availability and quality of data relating to forests in Eastern European countries vary considerably. Many countries have centralised forest inventories but there are very few available data for the Baltic States, Moldova and the European part of the Russian Federation. Economic data on production, trade and other factors, such as contribution to GDP/GNP, are either lacking or sometimes obsolete.

Few data are compiled on the specific environmental effects associated with forestry. This arises partly because parameters such as biodiversity, landscape value and conservation value are more difficult to measure than purely physical impacts such as soil quality and water pollution. In addition, efforts to assess such parameters on a comprehensive basis have yet to be mounted in most countries.

Although attempts have recently been made to collect data on factors relating to the non-wood-production forestry such as recreation, conservation, hunting, and so on, the material is generally restricted to questionnaire-based surveys (UNECE/FAO, 1992b) and thus very qualitative in nature. Furthermore, a bias may be introduced into the data depending on who is being surveyed.

Because of the diversity of conditions (for example as that between the Mediterranean basin, the mountainous areas of Europe, the North European plain and the boreal shield), it is impossible to generalise trends to the whole of Europe.

The country groupings adopted here are the same as those in Chapter 22 ­ Nordic, Eastern, Southern and Western European regions ­ and are based on physical and geographical areas which generally present similar behaviours (see Box 22A, for a precise description of the countries included in these regions). Since data are systematically, or often, lacking for some countries (Albania, Baltic States, Belarus, Cyprus, Malta, Moldova, Russian Federation, Ukraine), when the whole of Europe is mentioned, the figures given will always be underestimates. The Nordic region includes Finland, Norway and Sweden only, since there is hardly any forest in Iceland.