Addressing collaborative planning methods and tools in forest management

Addressing forest sustainability requires negotiation and integration of individual forest management plans of multiple small non-industrial forest owners (NIPF). Recently, Portuguese forest policy prescribed the creation of Areas for Forest Intervention (AFI/ZIF)—forest areas encompassing at least 1 × 103 ha and 50 NIPF—to address those requirements. Yet, the development of forest management plans for AFI is targeting multiple objectives in the framework of multiple-ownership. This is not trivial as conflict is prone to arise and negotiation is needed to satisfy individual and collective goals and constraints. This paper is prompted by the need to identify methods and tools that may be used to support forest management planning in the framework of an AFI. Emphasis is on the need of specific tools and methods that can support AFI management planning, in order to mitigate conflicts and achieve a consensual plan. This paper thus presents a review of methods and tools used to support group decision-making in forest management planning. It further discusses the potential of hybrid approaches for collaborative planning that may take advantage of the integrated functionality of both quantitative and qualitative decision support methods and tools.