A Bioeconomic Forest Management Model for the Mediterranean Forests: A Multicriteria Approach

Abstract

The management of forests in the Mediterranean basin is a complex problem, for which many political solutions have been used. In Portugal, these solutions tried to overcome the small property dimension, the elderly and/or absent owners and their relation with new functions and new approaches of forestry areas linked with changes on Common Agricultural Policy and the agriculture development paradigm. The solution must take into account the valorization of all economic activities that exist in the forest, but also the fire risk decreasing and the biodiversity preservation. This paper proposes a model that allows designing several economic scenarios, producing biodiversity and fire risk indicators, but also achieving the best compromise solution between these issues using compromise programming. The model was applied in a Forest Intervention Zone Arade-Alte/S. B. Messines, in the South of Portugal. The results show that themodel is able to provide important information by creating a complete management plan and simulating the best compromise solution among fire risk, economic result and the biodiversity indicator, providing an added background for the analysts. C