August 2023 Update: Highlighting Our Progress to Date
A year ago, I was two weeks into my role as Executive Director. I came in hungry to reinvigorate partners and to accelerate implementation. After a few years of a post-pandemic strategy hangover, it was time to make good on our promise to keep southern forests as forests, support private landowners in their management of those forests, and do both of those things while growing market opportunities.
There is still a road ahead of us, but we’ve put some innovative solutions in motion. We’re being guided by a bench of expert consultants, from conservation finance to systems dynamics to social science. We have new partners at the table and strong support from those who have been with us. Our community continues to show up. The momentum is palpable. And the future is bright.
“Our” accomplishments are not mine or Keeping Forests’. They are ours - yours and mine and all of those who have a vested interest in seeing this work succeed. On that note, here’s what we’ve been up to in recent months:
Partnership Level Initiatives
August 2023: We launched the Social Network Analysis with Visible Network Labs. This work will give us data-driven metrics that will lead to stronger strategies, improved decision-making, optimized resource investment, and streamlined communications. More importantly, it will allow us to build the kind of trusting relationships that make collaboration on complex issues possible.
We anticipate the results of this work will be delivered in November 2023.
Emerging Markets Initiatives
April 2023: We published a research paper in Science of the Total Environment that demonstrates the ecological benefits that forests provide to water quality and resilient supplies of drinking water. This work was done in collaboration with our partners at the USDA Southern Research Station (SRS) and NC State University. It is part of the foundation necessary for us to create a web application that will allow private landowners to determine the value of the ecosystem services that their forests provide. Before we can develop this application, we must complete the next phase to determine the economic value of these services.
We anticipate the economic valuation will be complete in early 2024.
June 2023: We convened forest landowners, developers, and realtors located in the Saludar River Basin (SC) to gain a first-hand perspective of the pressures and potential solutions for forest loss. Partners participated in a broader workshop to develop a community-based social marketing (CBSM) campaign. These campaigns are rooted in social science and data-driven, community-specific strategies. This watershed will serve as our first pilot to determine what motivates (or demotivates) participation in a voluntary payment for ecosystem services (PES). This recap of the week can provide greater insight into the work.
We will complete the research and development of the campaign by the end of 2023. We anticipate launching the campaign in early 2024.
Regenerative Forest Products Initiatives
August 2023: We felt a need to revisit our approach to developing markets for forest products. To date, our work has focused solely on education efforts for Mass Timber market development. The social, cultural, and economic landscape has shifted significantly since we first began implementation in 2020. To determine a path forward, we conducted interviews with experts and developed an analysis of all of the factors influencing forest products. We convened new and existing partners in a 3-day workshop to review the analysis and pinpoint the strategies that could make the biggest difference for the forest products markets. Preliminary results point to the development of a commodity brand for southern forest products.
Our next step is to determine the viability of this initiative which is wholly dependent on financing and partners’ willingness to participate in its development.
Champions and Leaders Initiatives
May 2023: We continue to promote the importance of southern working forests by demonstrating the many values they provide. We partner with leaders whose work represents those values to tell their story. Our latest work was with Alton Perry, Director of Roanoke Cooperative’s Sustainable Forestry and Land Retention Project (SFLRP). His work is focused on breaking historic barriers for African-American landowners, many of whom did not have prior access to knowledge of forestry, technical assistance, capital through USDA programs or attorneys for estate planning.
We will continue to collaborate with partners to deliver our shared message. In addition, 2024 will see this strategy focus on a 3rd and under-developed market for forest landowners. Stay tuned.
We will be telling the story of each of these initiatives as we head toward the end of the year. We’ll be pulling the curtain back so that you can see what this work is all about beyond the written word. I appreciate all of the support that you’ve given to Keeping Forests over the last year. We definitely have the right team in place to turn these big ideas into big impact.
Laura Calandrella
Keeping Forests Executive Director
Since Keeping Forests launched in 2016, Laura has been an advisor to Keeping Forests on the development of collaborative partnerships and collective impact strategies.
