Examining farm forest owners' forest management in Ireland: The role of economic, lifestyle and multifunctional ownership objectives

• This study identifies three core objectives for farmers forest ownership in Ireland.
• Economic objectives were positively related to active forest management.
• Lifestyle objectives had a negative effect on active forest management.
• Objectives could be identified by more easily observed owner and farm characteristics.
• Study will aid in more efficient targeting of incentives for forest management.

Using a nationally representative survey of 263 farm operators in Ireland, this study develops a typology of private forest landowners' objectives for forest ownership. It is important to understand farmers' forest ownership objectives as this will enhance economic analysis in general, but also to formulate more effective policies that take into account the range of motivational profiles of landowners. Using principal component analysis, three core motivations for forest ownership are identified representing economic, lifestyle and multifunctional benefits. Using a binary logistic regression model these ownership objectives were found to have a significant impact on farmers' forest management. For instance, farmers with relatively stronger economic motivations for forest ownership were found to be much more likely to harvest thinnings whereas the opposite was true of those with more lifestyle orientated objectives. In order to tailor policy at groups with different forest ownership objectives it will be important to be able to identify them through more easily observable owner and property characteristics. This study through multivariate regression analysis found factors such as age of the farm operator, land quality, system of farming, off farm employment and environmental attitudes were related to farm forest owners' ownership objectives. The study concludes that a better understanding of the heterogeneity in farmers' forest ownership objectives will enable policymakers to tailor incentives that more closely align with the diverse motivational profiles of different groups of landholders.