INTRODUCTION

1. During the two years since the previous meetings of the regional forest commissions for Latin America and the Caribbean and for North America in 1996, public debate about the management of natural resources in the United States has continued. There is widespread public support in the United States for a balanced approach to environmental, social and economic concerns about the management of public lands. Nonetheless, there are honest differences of opinion about these issues, especially regarding timber harvesting and road building on national forest lands.

2. Jack Ward Thomas retired as Chief of the USDA Forest Service at the end of 1996. He was replaced by Mike Dombeck in January, 1997. This report will focus on the changes which have been introduced in the Forest Service under Chief Dombeck.

A NATURAL RESOURCE AGENDA FOR THE 21^ST CENTURY

3. The national forests in the United States were established in large part in response to deforestation during the westward expansion of the 18^th and 19^th centuries. During the 20^th century, the philosophical basis for managing national forests gradually evolved from utilitarianism to sustained yield, to multiple use, and to ecosystem management. Science has played an increasingly important role, even as the public debate about natural resource policies has intensified.

4. The Forest Service natural resource agenda for the 21^st century recognizes the evolution of public land stewardship and seeks to carry it forward as we enter a new century. The agenda focuses on four key areas:

· Watershed health and restoration
· Sustainable forest ecosystem management
· Forest roads
· Recreation

Watershed Health and Restoration

5. Healthy watersheds are resilient in the face of natural events such as floods, fire and drought, and are more capable of absorbing the effects of human-induced disturbances. Watersheds absorb rain, recharge underground aquifers, provide cleaner water to people, and reduce drinking water treatment costs. They provide wildlife and fish habitat and connect headwaters to downstream areas and wetlands and riparian areas to uplands.

6. Healthy watersheds must be protected, and degraded watersheds must be restored. Wild areas must be protected so that they can remain important sources of clean water and biological diversity. The USDA Forest Service will:

· Make maintenance and restoration of watershed health an overriding priority in forest plans and provide measures for monitoring progress;

· Increase stream and riparian area restoration;

· Increase habitat restoration and conservation of threatened, endangered, and sensitive species;

· Increase the number of abandoned mine reclamation sites;

· Improve efforts to prevent non-native species from entering or spreading in the United States;

· Increase prescribed fire and forest fuels treatment in critical watersheds;

· Increase thinning in unnaturally dense forest stands, particularly along the urban-wildland interface.

Sustainable Forest Ecosystem Management

7. Economic stability and environmental protection go hand in hand - economic prosperity cannot occur without healthy, diverse, and productive watersheds and ecosystems. To keep US watersheds healthy and productive, we must better understand their status and condition across all ownerships. Protecting our environmental capital requires maintaining healthy and productive forest lands whether they are in urban or rural areas. Between 1978-94, the number of forest lands owned in parcels of 50 acres or less doubled. The increasing diminution of forest tract size can diminish wildlife habitat, reduce access, and degrade water quality.

8. The Forest Service is committed to:

· Work with state and local partners to use criteria and indicators of sustainable forest management to report on the health of all forested landscapes in the United States by 2003.

· Work with State Foresters and others to increase the number of non-industrial private forest landowners that complete long-term forest stewardship plans.

· Work with other federal agencies and Congress to develop policies that encourage long-term investments in forests and discourage their conversion to other uses.

· Increase the amount of research and technical assistance to forest products industries so that they can more profitably harvest small diameter wood, increase the use of secondary markets for wood products, and market more finished wood products.

Forest Roads

9. Few natural resource issues in recent years have captured as much political attention and public scrutiny as management of the national forest road system. Forest roads are an essential part of the transportation system in many rural parts of the country. They help to meet recreation demands on national forests and grasslands. They provide economic opportunities by facilitating the removal of commodities from the national forest system, which in turn provides jobs and revenue.

10. The benefits of forest roads are many. So too are the ecological impacts on watersheds. There are few more irreparable marks we can leave on the land than to build a road. Improperly located, designed or maintained roads contribute to erosion, wildlife and fish habitat fragmentation, degradation of water quality, and the dispersal of exotic species.

11. The new forest road policy has four primary objectives:

· More carefully consider decisions to build new roads.

· Eliminate old unneeded roads.

· Upgrade and maintain roads that are important to public access.

· Develop new and dependable funding for forest road management.

Recreation

12. The final piece of the agenda recognizes that recreation is the fastest growing use of national forests and grasslands. It provides the link - a window through which an increasingly urban society can enjoy and appreciate the natural world. Forest Service managed lands provide more outdoor recreation opportunities than anywhere else in the United States. The Forest Service is committed to providing superior customer service and ensuring that the rapid growth of recreation on national forests does not compromise the long-term health of the land. The recreation agenda will focus on four key areas:

· Provide quality settings and experiences

· Focus on customer service and satisfaction

· Emphasize community outreach

· Strengthen relationships with partners, communities, and others.

ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGES

13. The major change in the organizational structure of the Forest Service in the past two years is the establishment of a Chief Operating Officer to oversee accountability and business practices. Francis Pandolfi was appointed to this position in April, 1998. In addition to the Chief Operating Officer, new positions have been established for a Chief Financial Officer and a Deputy Chief for Business Operations.

14. The National Forest System continues to be organized into nine regions. There is a long-term trend to combine national forest and ranger district offices in order to reduce overhead costs. Advances in telecommunications technology are enabling this trend to accelerate. In addition, a number of service centers have been established at the sub-regional level to provide business support services to multiple field units at a lower cost.

15. Total funding for Forest Service programs has been fairly stable in the past few years, but there has been a long-term decline in real terms. The number of permanent full-time employees has declined from about 33,000 in 1993 to about 28,000 in 1998. This trend is consistent with the overall downsizing of the federal government in the United States. This creates a tremendous challenge to the Forest Service to maintain or even increase the quality of services provided to the American people through improved efficiency.

16. Updated information about the USDA Forest Service is available on the internet: http://www.fs.fed.us/

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE IPF PROPOSALS FOR ACTION

17. The Forest Service actively participated in the deliberations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests (IPF), which developed 135 proposals for action that were endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly in June 1997. Most of the proposals apply to all countries, including the United States.

18. Many of the IPF proposals are already being implemented in the United States. For example, countries are encouraged to develop participatory approaches to promote the conservation of forests, to improve land tenure arrangements, to strengthen forest research institutions and to assess forest resources. The United States has in place a comprehensive system of democratic institutions and secure land tenure and property rights, and hundreds of millions of dollars are allocated each year to forest research and forest assessments.

19. Yet there is debate within the United States among those who claim that our current forest practices are sustainable, and those who are concerned about the deterioration of forest ecosystems and threats to endangered species. Most of the people who think and care about forests would agree that there is room for improvement in the ways in which people with different opinions work together to solve problems, that there is a need for more funding for forest research and development and that forest assessments need to be more comprehensive, timely, and relevant.

20. In 1993 the President's Council on Sustainable Development was formed to provide broad policy guidance for sustainable development in the United States. Under the leadership of the Secretary of Agriculture, who is a member of the President's Council, the United States is in the early stages of a comprehensive consultative process involving all sectors of society in discussions about the implementation of actions related to sustainable development, including the IPF proposals for action. The progress made in these discussions will be reported at appropriate intervals to the Intergovernmental Forum on Forests (IFF) and the United Nations Commission for Sustainable Development.

Participation in forest decision-making processes

21. One of the cross-cutting issues in many of the IPF proposals for action is the need to increase participation in forest decision-making practices. From his first day in office, Chief Dombeck has stressed "collaborative stewardship" and the importance of trying to find common ground.

22. Perhaps the most intriguing development in forestry in the United States in recent years is the grass roots movement at the local level to bring people together to work toward consensus on local resource issues. All over the country, Forest Service managers are consulting with local citizens and interest groups to discuss forest plans or to debate the merits of a local timber sale or other contentious issue. Hundreds of line managers (regional foresters, forest supervisors, and district rangers) are working to build community approaches to forest decisions. The United States acknowledges that we are trying approaches which have been pioneered in other countries, including developing countries.

23. At the national level, resource management issues are debated daily in the halls of the US Congress. An unprecedented number of public hearings have been called on issues involving the management of public and private forest lands. A Committee of Scientists has been appointed to explore new approaches for forest planning. Within the Forest Service, policies are increasingly developed through participatory approaches using task forces with a cross-section of staff who consult with external partners, rather than by traditional top-down bureaucratic decisions.

24. The democratic tradition on which the United States is built is alive and well in the forest sector. A broad consultative process involving all major interest groups is being developed to review progress made on implementing the IPF actions as well as other aspects of sustainable development.

Underlying causes of deforestation and forest degradation

25. A major debate at IPF concerned the "underlying causes of deforestation and degradation of forests."

26. In our last report on forestry in the United States presented to the Latin American and Caribbean Forestry Commission and to the North American Forest Commission in 1996, we recalled the historical change in forest cover in the United States. It was noted that an estimated 50% of the United States was forested at the time of the first European settlements. By 1920, forests had declined to about 30% of the total area of the United States. About 40% of the original forests of the United States had been lost in a period of 400 years.

27. But the 20^th century has witnessed a major change in land uses in the United States. There has been a major migration from farms and rural areas to cities and suburbs; incomes and agricultural productivity have increased; and fossil fuels have replaced wood as the major source of energy. Over 100 national forests were established, and most states enacted laws to regulate the harvesting of private forests.

28. During the 20^th century, the total forest land area in the United States has stabilized and even increased in many states, especially in the East, as marginal farm lands reverted to forest. About 33% of the nation's land is now forested, an increase of about 10% since 1920. Today, the annual increment in wood fiber significantly exceeds the amount lost to disease or harvest, and the number of trees planted greatly exceeds the number harvested each year.

29. "Deforestation", if defined as a loss of forest cover, is not a significant national problem as the United States enters the 21^st century. However, there is great concern about the health of many of the nation's forests. Consider the following:

In the intermountain West, fire suppression has allowed forests to become overcrowded. Forests cannot resist drought and insect and disease attacks. America's Forests: 1996 Health Update, USDA Forest Service, 1996

Many people, including professional foresters, believe there are serious forest health problems in many parts of the country. Forest Health and Productivity: A Perspective of the Forestry Profession, Society of American Foresters, 1997

30. Most debates about forest policy today in the United States do not concern deforestation, but rather how to best manage forests - both public forests and private forests - to ensure healthy forest ecosystems. The USDA Forest Service is implementing strategies which take the issue of forest degradation and forest health very seriously.

31. An excellent overview of the issues and problems associated with forest health can be found in the publication, Health of North American Forests, published in English, French and Spanish by the Atmospheric Changes and Forests Study Group of the North American Forest Commission and the Canadian Forest Service in 1996.

Assessing the multiple benefits of forests

32. The IPF called upon countries to strengthen forest assessments, including increased use of remote sensing, and to implement internationally agreed criteria and indicators for sustainable forest management in order to monitor progress toward sustainability.

33. The US Forest Service spends about $100 million each year on forest assessments, including $20 million on the national forest inventory and analysis program (FIA) which covers all non-federal forest lands, and considerably more on the assessment of the health and resources of national forests. The main issue in the United States is not the commitment, but rather the effectiveness of forest assessments.

34. Over the past several years, a number of steps have been taken to try to improve the timeliness and relevance of forest assessments. One important change is the advent of forest health monitoring programs which move beyond the traditional approaches of forest inventories to include a range of indicators of forest health. Rather than the 10-year cycle of the FIA program, some of the new approaches to monitoring forest health are carried out every three years or even annually.

35. The Forest Service has established a national Inventory and Monitoring Institute to coordinate assessments at various levels and scales in order to improve their effectiveness. On the technical front, remote sensing technology is being used more and more, and geographic information system (GIS) technology is now used in virtually every location where forests are managed at the federal, state and private levels.

36. A broad base of support has been built in the public and private sectors for using the Montreal Process criteria and indicators (C&I) as the national review of trends in forest conditions and uses. A "first approximation report" was prepared in 1996 on the Montreal Process C&I at the national level; the Chief has announced that the first comprehensive national report will be prepared by 2003; and the United States actively supported a pilot test of C&I at the field level (in collaboration with CIFOR, Mexico and Canada).

G-8 ACTION PROGRAM ON FORESTS

37. The G-8 countries have agreed to implement an action program on forests to promote sustainable forest management, complementing the work of the IFF. The G-8 includes: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States. The G-8 action program includes five major initiatives:

· Monitoring and assessment: G-8 members will monitor and assess the state of their own forests using agreed criteria and indicators; participate in the FRA 2000 global assessment of forest resources; and work with partner countries to strengthen their forest monitoring and assessment capabilities.

· National forest programs: G-8 members will encourage partner countries to develop and implement national forest programs which give priority to sustainable forest management.

· Protected areas: G-8 members will work to achieve a broad consensus on categories of protected areas, their management and the biodiversity and other ecological values and benefits they bring to key stakeholders.

· Private sector: G-8 members will encourage the private sector to develop voluntary codes of conduct and to invest in sustainable forest management.

· Illegal logging: G-8 members will take steps to control illegal logging and international trade in illegally harvested timber.