Expanding Forests’ Benefits: Forest-based Recreation and Tourism

Dear Colleagues,

People, all over the world, look to their forests to provide a wealth of economic and non-economic benefits. In many cases, policy makers and forest managers have a difficult time directly addressing the many intangible, but highly valued benefits derived from recreation and tourism activities. For example, forests provide people with opportunities to view and experience aesthetic and restorative environments, relieve mental stress, and become physically fit. Moreover forest- based tourism is a growing land-use activity and an important economic sector that involves a variety of different types of entrepreneurs, many of which are relatively small, located in rural regions, and might only work part-time in tourism combined with agriculture, forestry or other rural means of livelihood. Many of these businesses are challenged by seasonality in tourism demand and the use of natural areas for tourism and recreation purposes might conflict with other natural resource uses. Even with the complex and valuable role recreation and tourism plays in forest management, it is somewhat rare to find the benefits of forest-based recreation and tourism specifically addressed in forest strategies or management plans. Over the last half century, social science researchers have made great strides to better understand how to provide opportunities to attain the wealth of personal, social, economic, and environmental benefits available through the use of forests for recreation and tourism. In this special issue, we will provide examples of research from around the world that highlights the state-of-the art information related to recreation and tourism forest policies, strategies, and management. From the identification of recreation indicators to the development of social theories, like place attachment, this special issue will provide a contemporary illustration of recreation and tourism’s role in expanding and improving forest management.

Taylor V. Stein
Frank Søndergaard Jensen
Nobuhiko Tanaka
Liisa Tyrväinen
Guest Editors