A Market-Based Solution to Conserving Family Forests

Unofficial AI-generated summary based on the public title and abstract. Not an official translation.

🔬研究者:Provides a detailed case study on the design and implementation of a carbon market program targeted at small forest owners, with lessons for carbon accounting and additionality.

🏢実務担当者:Offers a blueprint for developing carbon offset programs that engage fragmented landowners, relevant to forestry and carbon project developers.

🏛政策担当者:Demonstrates how market mechanisms can scale conservation beyond public funding, with implications for national carbon credit frameworks and rural development policy.

Conserving forests at scale is one of the most cost-effective strategies available for addressing climate change, biodiversity loss, and rural economic decline simultaneously. In the United States, family forest owners (FFOs)—who collectively control the largest share of forestland—play an outsized role in determining environmental outcomes. Yet traditional conservation models dependent on public appropriations and philanthropy have struggled to reach this constituency at scale. This paper argues that market based conservation approaches, particularly voluntary carbon markets designed for small landowners, offer a scalable, credible, and economically durable solution. Using the Family Forest Carbon Program developed by the American Forest Foundation (AFF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) as a case study, this article illustrates how private climate finance can be leveraged to improve forest health, enhance biodiversity, and strengthen rural economies while maintaining high standards of environmental integrity.

• openalex https://doi.org/10.5070/p5.65806first seen 2026-06-10 04:44:15