Forests Monitor is global in scope and publishes scientific articles and current perspectives about forests and sustainable management of forest ecosystems to achieve better governance. Acceptance for publication is subject to a double-blind peer-review process. Its advantages include:

• Independence from large publishers
• Fee for reviewers to fairly reward their work
• High quality and quick speed of reviews (usually less than 2 weeks), partly thanks to the fees for reviewers
• Transparent and affordable page expenses (calculated per page)
• Articles published fast after acceptance
• Internationally recognized experts in the Scientific Board
• No additional cost for color graphics and tables
• Editing services included in the publication fee
• Digital and social media marketing of published articles

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EDITORIAL TEAM

Editors:

Vilis Brukas, PhD

Dr. Vilis Brukas is a professor in forest planning at the Southern Swedish Forest Research Centre, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). His research interests include but are not limited to mixes of policy instruments, interface between policy and planning, approaches to forest management across Europe or forest governance in transition economies. 

Raised in Lithuania, he earned his Master's degree in forestry in 1997 and a Ph.D. in Denmark in 2000. His unique educational background exposed him to diverse forest governance models, fueling his passion for forest policy as an academic discipline.

Livia Zapponi, PhD

Livia Zapponi is a researcher at the Institute of BioEconomy of the National Research Council of Italy (CNR), where she focuses her activities on forest ecology. In particular, she studies saproxylic insects and how to implement sustainable forest management strategies to improve their conservation. She has contributed to several projects analysing the drivers of forest biodiversity, to explore the effect of forest management on animal communities and to develop biodiversity indicators. Besides, she also investigates the sustainable management of insect pests.

Livia received her PhD in Biodiversity and Ecosystem Analysis from Roma Tre University in 2010 and holds two Masters of Science, in Ecology (Sapienza University of Rome) and in Environmental Management (University of Nottingham).

Rafał Chudy, PhD

Dr. Rafał Chudy has over 11 years of professional experience in project management within natural resources, forest economics, and finances. During the last years, Dr. Chudy worked for private equity and consultancy companies from the United States, Australia, and Norway where he was responsible for ensuring that strong research and evidence-based insights underpin companies sustainable investment programs and services in real assets, mostly forestry & carbon, agriculture, or infrastructure. Dr. Chudy's research has appeared in peer-reviewed journals and presentations at the international forest and natural resource economics conferences.

He holds a Master of Science (Forestry) degree from Warsaw University of Life Sciences, Master of Science (Forestry and Environmental Resources) from North Carolina State University, Master of Science (Forest Management) from Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, and a PhD in Forest Economics (specialising in Forest Sector Modelling) from Norwegian University of Life Sciences. Dr. Chudy also has a post-graduate diploma in Financial Controlling in Capital Markets Groups from Warsaw School of Economics.

Karolina Chudy, MBA

Karolina Chudy is the Chief Executive Officer at the Forest Business Analytics (FBA), focusing on the supervision of the projects related to timberland investments and forest products markets. Karolina is also responsible for the implementation of comprehensive client service plans for existing and future clients. Before joining FBA, Karolina worked as a data visualization specialist at the European Commission – Joint Research Centre, where she analyzed massive data sets in Tableau software to provide strategic insights.

She holds a Bachelor's Degree in Analysis and Business Administration from the University of Lodz, a Bachelor's Degree in International Business from Østfold University College in Norway and a double International Master of Business Administration Degree (IMBA) at EAE Business School and University of Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid, Spain. Karolina also has accomplished the Fundamentals of Alternative Investments program organized by the Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst (CAIA) Association.

Frederick Cubbage, PhD

Fred Cubbage teaches, performs research, and serves the profession in natural resource policy and forest economics. He has worked at the University of Georgia, the USDA Forest Service, and North Carolina State University. He has authored or co-authored about 550 papers and articles, and 4 books, including a new book in 2022 on Natural Resource Leadership and Management published by Routledge Press.

Fred was the Department Head of Forestry and Environmental Resources at NC State for 10 years, and was the Founder and Co-Director of the Southern Forest Resource Assessment Consortium (SOFAC) for 25 years.  Fred was a Fulbright Scholar in Argentina and Uruguay in 2004, and consulted for the World Bank and has cooperated with scientists in Latin America, Vietnam, Laos, and China for two decades.  He was President of the Society of American Foresters in 2017.

Kevin Boston, PhD

Dr. Kevin Boston has a strong academic and professional background and has earned a BS in forestry from Humboldt State University, Master of Forestry, and Ph.D. in forest engineering from Oregon State University.  His JD is from Lewis and Clark College and emphasized environmental and corporate law.  He has significant professional experience as a practicing forester, and it includes both a California Registered Professional Forester and Professional Engineer in Oregon. 

Dr. Boston has authored over 100 papers and seven books in forest management and engineering. He has held a variety of commercial appointments in forestry throughout the United States, New Zealand and Europe. Dr. Boston is currently an associate professor with the Center for Forest Business at the University of Arkansas, Monticello.

Scientific Board Members:

Meley Mekonen Rannestad, PhD

Meley Mekonen Rannestad is a researcher in tropical forests and climate change in the Faculty of Environmental Sciences and Natural Resource Management (MINA) at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU). She holds a PhD in Forest and Resource Economics and master's degree in international environmental studies from NMBU.

Her research focuses on sustainable and climate-smart management of tropical forests and the economics of tropical forests-based climate change mitigation. Her earlier works have been published in top-tier journals in her field. Rannestad has extensive experience in the management of large-scale (>NOK 15 million budget) research and capacity-building projects related to tropical forest management. Currently, she is leading a research project financed by the Research Council of Norway (RCN) that is developing a decision support tool that enables ex-ante assessments of policies and interventions to minimize tradeoffs and maximize synergies between global environmental, national economic and local subsistence and/or livelihood objectives/demands related to tropical forests in East Africa.

Austin Himes, PhD

Austin Himes is an Assistant Professor in the School of the Environment at Washington State University. Prior to his academic career, he worked for GreenWood Resources, Inc. conducting applied forestry research and managing hybrid-poplar plantations. His research interests are interdisciplinary and revolve around silviculture and management of forests for multiple ecosystem services and diverse values. He has authored peer-reviewed articles on many topics ranging from trade-offs between ecosystem services in plantation forests, the carbon benefits of building with wood, short-rotation wood crop systems and the different ways that people value nature.

Austin received his PhD in Forest Ecosystems and Society from Oregon State University in 2019 and holds a M.S. from the University of Washington School of Environmental and Forest Sciences. He is a Society of American Foresters Certified Forester.

Marco Mina, PhD

Marco Mina is a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Alpine Environment at Eurac Research, Bolzano/Bozen, Italy. He is specialized in the application of simulation models of forest dynamics to explore interactions of trees with their changing environment and forest management strategies to enhance long-term resistance and resilience at multiple scales - from stand to landscape. His research interests also include silviculture, forest monitoring and inventory, forest biodiversity and ecosystem services.

Marco received his PhD in forest ecology from ETH Zurich in Switzerland in 2015 and holds a MSc from the University of Padua, Italy. He also worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Université du Québec á Montreal, Canada, between 2018 and 2021. He is a member of the Italian Society of Forest Ecology and Silviculture (SISEF) and has an active collaborative network across Europe and North America. 

Diana Feliciano, PhD

Diana Feliciano has worked as a transdisciplinary scientist before she joined Teesside University International Business School as a Professor of Climate Change and Sustainable Economic Development in 2022. She holds a PhD in Geography, an MSc in Economics and a five-year degree in Engineering with specialisation in forestry and natural resource management.

She has previously worked at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, at the International Social Science Council - UNESCO in Paris, at the James Hutton Institute in Scotland and at the Catolica Porto Business School in Portugal. She also undertook a secondment at the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) in London (from November 2018 to March 2019), an agency under the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy that advises the UK Government and the Devolved Administrations on greenhouse gas emissions targets and on climate change adaptation for all sectors of the economy. 

Her research focuses on the role of land to deliver multiple benefits (climate change adaptation and mitigation, sustainable food production, ecosystem services, rural prosperity) taking into consideration the interconnections across spatial scales namely farm level, community level, regional level, national level, global level. She has worked on several research projects in the UK, several European countries and in Guatemala, Ethiopia and South Africa, with a wide range of stakeholders such as politicians, policy makers, practitioners, farmers, indigenous communities, associations of councils and researchers to discuss sustainable food production, property rights, environmental justice, climate change, gender and well-being. She has also collaborated with several global-level organisations, namely CGIAR-CCAFS, UNECE, FAO and the World Bank.

She has published widely in the field of wicked environmental problems (climate change, sustainable agriculture, forest management, renewable energy) and has a substantial record of publications in international high-impact journals. She teaches on the topics of Climate Change Science, Climate Change Policy, Food Economics, The Value of Nature, Political Economy, Markets and Commodities, Sustainable Food Production and Ecological Economics to both undergraduate and MSc students. She speaks English, Spanish, French and Portuguese, plays the piano, is a rock climber and lives in Teesdale.

Yennie Bredin, PhD

Yennie Bredin is a researcher with the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research in Oslo, Norway. She has a PhD in tropical forest ecology and a master’s degree in tropical ecology and natural resource management from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

Yennie’s research has focused on floodplain forest ecology, forest biodiversity and carbon, and the human dimensions of biodiversity conservation. She is currently working on several national and international multi-, and transdisciplinary research projects related to the restoration, enhancement, and conservation of biodiversity.

Jacek Siry, PhD

Dr. Siry’s expertise includes international investments and finance, business management, and policy; wood products trade, availability, and costs; and forest management across the world’s leading wood supply regions. His research is focused on the global competitiveness of forest industries, international forest investments, timber market modelling, and forest management efficiency.

Currently, Dr. Siry is Stuckey Timberland Professor of Forest Economics and Taxation, The Harley Langdale Jr. Center for Forest Business, Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources, University of Georgia, USA.

Krzysztof Niedziałkowski, PhD

Dr habil. Krzysztof Niedziałkowski is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, a member of the Board of the Climate Crisis Committee of the Polish Academy of Sciences, and Vice-President of the Environmental Sociology Section of the Polish Sociological Society.

His research interests include environmental policy dynamics, determinants of environmental conflicts, and relationships between discourses and institutions regulating natural resource management. His research projects have contributed to understanding the mechanisms of governance of protected areas, wildlife and forests. His work has been published in journals such as Ecology and Society, Ecological Economics and Environmental Politics. His most recent project, conducted as part of the international ForestValue consortium, examines the impacts of climate change on forest management.

Federico E. Alice Guier, PhD

Federico E. Alice-Guier has a bachelor’s degree in forestry from the National University of Costa Rica, a master's degree in carbon management from the University of Edinburgh and a PhD in production ecology and resource conservation from Wageningen University. Works on the application of systems thinking and dynamics to study global environmental change; and promoting the implementation of nature-based solutions. He is currently a professor of Forestry and Environmental Management at the School of Environmental Sciences of the National University of Costa Rica.

Valentina Vitali, PhD

Dr. Valentina Vitali is a forest ecology researcher at the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) and the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH-Zürich), in Switzerland. Her goal is to understand the mechanisms responsible for forest resilience to ensure future sustainable forest management.Her research focuses on the impact of climate change on the processes that drive and regulate forest growth, biogeochemical cycles, and biodiversity-ecosystem functioning. She investigates the impact of biotic and abiotic stressors on tree physiology and biochemistry using analyses of tree rings and stable isotope studies. In collaboration with the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), Valentina conducts research in urban environments to promote biodiversity conservation.

Valentina Vitali received her PhD in forest ecology from the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Germany, in 2017, and an M.Sc. in Conservation and Land Management from Bangor University, Wales, UK and M.Sc. in Sustainable Forest and Nature Management, from Georg-August Universität, Göttingen, Germany.

Shaun Tanger, PhD

Shaun Tanger is an Associate Professor of Forest Policy and Trade with the Arkansas Forest Business Center in the College of Forestry, Agriculture and Natural Resources. Dr. Tanger’s research program is focused on forest economics, policy and trade questions.

Currently he is examining interstate carbon leakage and carbon market participation under various tax structure alternatives. He is the co-host of the Timber University podcast, part of the Natural Resources University podcast network.

Miguel Montoro Girona, PhD

Miguel Montoro Girona is professor in forest ecology at UQAT (Canada). His research aims to evaluate the impact of natural (insect outbreak, fire, moose, beaver, windthrow) and anthropogenic disturbances (log drive and silvicultural practices) on forest ecosystem at multiples spatio-temporal scales to provide tools for the implementation of forest sustainable management in the face of climate change. He uses paleoecological and dendroecological approaches to reconstruct past disturbance regimes, or landscape simulations to predict the future of forest ecosystems.

Recently, he funded a research Group – GREMA (link) to help the regional institutions to apply sustainable forestry and to adapt forest management strategies to climate change.

Rita Sousa-Silva, PhD

Rita Sousa-Silva is an Assistant Professor in Environmental Biology at the Institute of Environmental Sciences at Leiden University, the Netherlands.

Rita's research interests include forest and urban ecology, with a focus on the role of tree species diversity in the functioning of forest ecosystems, from natural forests to urban environments. She also investigates the relationships between urban trees and human health and well-being, aiming to translate this knowledge into strategies for planning and managing green spaces to optimize multiple services and benefits.

Rita received her PhD in forest ecology from KU Leuven, Belgium, in 2018. She is a member of TreeDivNet, a global network of tree diversity experiments, and Co-Chair of the Biodiversa+ Knowledge Hub on Nature-based Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation.

Giorgio Vacchiano, PhD

Giorgio Vacchiano is associate professor in Forest management and planning at University of Milan, Italy. He studies simulation models to support sustainable forest management, forest mitigation of climate change, and forest adaptation to extreme climate events in European temperate forests. He is active in science education and communication. In 2018 he was named by the journal Nature as one of the eleven best emerging scientists in the world who are "leaving their mark in science".

He is a member of the Italian Society of Silviculture and Forest Ecology (SISEF), of which he coordinates the working group on communication, and of the Ecological Society of America (ESA).

Gregory E. Frey, PhD

Dr. Gregory Frey is a Research Forester at the USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station. His work focuses on forest law and policy, including understanding the effects of incentives, regulation, and taxes. After volunteering as an environmental educator in the US Peace Corps in Paraguay, Greg Frey returned to North Carolina to receive his PhD at NC State University (Raleigh) in forest economics, studying the feasibility and profitability of timber investments and agroforestry systems. Dr. Frey has worked at the World Bank, helping countries fight deforestation, and at Virginia State University, teaching about resource management and sustainable income streams. Greg currently lives in Raleigh, NC.

Stefanie Linser, PhD

Dr. Stefanie Linser holds a PhD and an MSc in forestry sciences. She has been working for 25 years in national and international forest policy issues and is a recognised expert on indicators for sustainable forest management (SFM) and related data. She has compiled data and provided input and indicator expertise to national and international organisations.

Since many years she is nominated to the UNECE/FAO Team of Specialists on forest Monitoring and is the deputy leader of this team since 2018. She was coordinating lead-author of the State of Europe’s Forests 2020 report and of the Austrian report on indicators for SFM 2020. She launched and still coordinates the IUFRO Working Party 9.01.05 on Research and Development of Indicators for SFM. She is also in in the steering committee for the further development of the FAO Global Core Set of Indicators for SFM and in the Forest Europe Think Tank Core Group. Her present focus of work is on the further development and improvement of indicators for sustainable forest management and related monitoring, reporting and assessment.

Jerylee Wilkes-Allemann, PhD

Jerylee Wilkes-Allemann is a senior researcher, forest policy scientists and lecturer at the Bern university of Applied Sciences, at the School of Agricultural, Forest and Food Sciences HAFL, Switzerland. Her research focuses on forest policy, forest governance, sustainability, communication strategies and participatory processes, ecosystem services, urban forestry and the positive effects of nature (trees and forests) on human health. Jerylee is also involved in the CAS Urban Forestry and CAS Nature en Ville.

Jerylee received her PhD in forest policy and governance from the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich and Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) in Switzerland in 2015. She holds a Diploma in forest science from the Albert-Ludwigs University Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany. Since 2023, Jerylee is a certified forest therapist. She has coordinated several national and international research projects and worked as a scientific collaborator at Agroscope in Switzerland between 2009 and 2011 and as a postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich between 2015 and 2020.

Jerylee is involved in several steering committees. She is co-president of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft für den Wald, an association representing more than 20 Swiss organisations working with or within the Swiss forests, and co-funder and board member of ArboCityNet, a Swiss association working in the field of Urban Forestry in the Swiss context. Since 2022 she is member of the steering committee of EFUF and responsible for the EFUF communication strategy.

Laura Bouriaud, PhD

Graduated in Forestry (Ștefan cel Mare University of Suceava) and in Legal Sciences (A.I. Cuza University, Iași), Laura Bouriaud has a Master degree in Political sciences in Nancy and a PhD in Forestry from AgroParisTech, France. She is a specialist in the field of forest policy analysis, with particular qualification on the climate change policies, private forestry and policies against illegal logging, as shown by her published works, as well as by her consultant missions to Kosovo, Russia, Montenegro, Albania and Republic of Moldova.

With more than 25 years of teaching experience in the field of Environmental and Forestry Law and Policy, Ms. Laura Bouriaud also has a rich research activity, leading as project manager 15 research grants, with a total budget of 1,8 million euro, targeting the sustainable and innovative use of the natural resources, including the biomass production, forest adaptation to climate change, or governance arrangements in ecosystem services delivering.

During her career, she has published eight books and over 60 articles, and she got her habilitation thesis in 2016. In recognition of her professional experience, Ms. Laura Bouriaud has been guest or organizer of international scientific conferences and she participated in evaluation committees for several doctoral theses defended in European universities. She is also reviewer for several scientific journals in the field, and member of the editorial board of Forest Policy and Economics, Rivista Quadrimestrale di Diritto dell’Ambiente and Bucovina Forestieră.

Professor Laura Bouriaud also has been involved in teaching activities at AgroParisTech France, and she is an associate researcher of the French Forest Inventory Laboratory from Nancy (IGN). In 2022, she was decorated with the Order of "Agricultural Merit" in the rank of Knight, by the Ministry of Agriculture, France. Since 2020, Laura Bouriaud is the director of the Council of Doctoral Studies at Ștefan cel Mare University of Suceava, being responsible with the coordination of the doctoral studies programmes. Laura Bouriaud is also a former member of the National Scientific Ethic council, and she is actively involved in providing expertise in forest policy process formulation in Romania.

Norbert Weber, PhD

Prof. Dr. Norbert Weber is Chairholder of the Professorship of Forest Policy and Resource Economics at TUD – Dresden University of Technology, Germany and acting as Head of the Department of Forest Sciences at TUD. He has been researching in the field of forest and environmental policy, partly with a coordinator role in European networks on research and teaching. His special interest lies in policy formulation, implementation and coherence in multi-level systems in Europe. Besides, he has been active as a reviewer for many scientific journals as well as project evaluator for national research institutions.

Todora Rogelja, PhD

Todora holds a PhD in Land, Environment, Resources and Health (LERH) from the University of Padova, Department of Land, Environment, Agriculture and Forestry (TESAF), and an M.Sc. in Forest Policy and Economics from the International FOPER Master Programme, awarded by the University of Belgrade. She works as a researcher at the University of Padova, TESAF Department, being currently engaged in several large European projects. Todora has more than 10 years of professional experience working on forest policy in governance, focusing on actors’ constellations, social innovation and policy and analysis. She is interested in qualitative and mixed methods. Todora is the deputy coordinator of IUFRO Research Group 4.05.05. on Social and Institutional Innovations and Entrepreneurship. During the last three years, she was intensively involved in the topic of gender equity, diversity and inclusion and was one of three main coordinators of the Massive Open Online Course ForGEDI.