Transforming management of natural systems from uniformity to complexity in today’s uncertain times

“As a trained forester, I was taught to manage forests to be as uniform as possible to maximise productivity and facilitate management. Uniformity is the norm in most natural systems we manage, from our home gardens, urban parks to large forest plantations. Uniformity has many advantages but has one huge disadvantage: a uniform natural system tends to be less resilient and less adaptable to novel and unexpected environmental conditions. In this talk, I will summarize almost 20 years of research we have done in my lab showing how managing natural systems for complexity makes sense for our home garden, a row of trees in a city, a 5-ha tree plantation and a 100 000-ha natural forest”
The talk will be held in English and will last about 45 min followed by a 15 min of questions and discussion.

Christian Messier is professor of Forest Ecology and Urban Forestry and scientific director of the Institute of temperate Forest Sciences ISFORT at the University of Quebec, Canada (UQO and UQAM). He obtained his PhD from the University of British Columbia, followed by a post-doc at the University of Helsinki. His research interests range from the basic understanding of tree growth and mortality, forest community and ecosystem functioning to decision-making tools to better manage and conserve natural and urban forests. He has published more than 300 referee papers, reports, book chapters and books. He holds an industrial-NSERC research Chair on tree growth since 2010 and a Canada Research Chair on the resilience of managed forest to global change since 2017. See here a recent interview (in French) https://youtu.be/yqt8tMHpn2Y