In late May 2024, the wildE team gathered in the village Tatranská Lomnica in the High Tatra Mountains for a three-day workshop that placed a spotlight on the role of the social sciences in rewilding. The Tatra Mountains are uniquely situated. Straddling the border between Poland and Slovakia, they comprise individual National Parks in both countries and have been designated a transboundary biosphere reserve by the UNESCO. These mountains harbour some of the best-conserved pristine forests in central Europe and a rich biodiversity including numerous emblematic animal species threatened with extinction. The Tatra Mountains are a treasured symbol in their countries, inspiring myths and legends; the Kriváň peak even features on Slovak coins. The area also bears testimony to a victory of Slovak environmentalists who fought intensely to save National Park core areas from extensive salvage logging after a major windthrow in 2004 and to allow forests instead to regenerate naturally. Yet other problems remain and it has become increasingly evident that integrating socio-economic sciences and fostering effective dialogue among scientists, conservationists, foresters, practitioners, and the general public is critical for helping to ensure a smooth coexistence between the human and non-human inhabitants of the area. This makes the Tatra Mountains an ideal location for spotting bears, lynx or capercaillies and for exploring a key element of wildE’s climate-smart approach to rewilding: the synergy between people and the environment. With this purpose in mind, the workshop brought together social and environmental scientists, local and regional stakeholders and National Park employees.
On the first day, a 15 km hike in a National Park core area near the Kriváň peak provided the academic workshop participants (plus three invited journalists) with a privileged insight into the Park’s nature under the highly instructive guidance of the naturalist and documentary filmer Erik Baláž. The hike provided ample opportunities for inspecting the vigourous natural forest regeneration that has taken place since the last windthrows in the area and the diversity of habitats that this process is generating. Such habitats are critical for animals such as the capercaillie which have almost disappeared outside forest reserves because of widespread silvicultural practices such as salvage logging and the systematic removal of deadwood. Salvage logging is sometimes even carried out in protected areas of Slovakia on the basis that this minimises economic losses; however, the significant ecological damages of the practice are typically not considered.
While observing traces of capercaillies and brown bears, the workshop participants discussed the implications of forest management on forest ecology and people. Disturbances such as windthrows, fires, droughts or pest outbreaks are an integral part of natural forest dynamics, and their frequency and impact are growing as a consequence of global warming. This trend is successively exacerbating the economic costs of technological forest management approaches that strive to rapidly remove dead trees and plant young ones. One possible solution could be moving to a lower-impact forestry that focuses more on natural forest regeneration and balances lower economic returns with lower costs and reduced risks (because naturally regenerated forests tend to be less vulnerable to disturbances than planted ones). Such forestry could greatly enhance biodiversity and diverse ecosystem services, yet it requires a detailed understanding of natural forest regeneration which is currently very limited. The two Tatra National Parks provide a highly suited terrain for acquiring this sort of knowledge, and ongoing research is exploring how their forests behave if left to grow naturally in the aftermath of a storm. Interestingly, this research is revealing that naturally regenerating forests are not only important refuges for biodiversity but also more effective in storing atmospheric CO2 than comparable planted forests.
The second and third day were dedicated to extensive discussions and interviews with wildE scientists, local and regional stakeholders, and employees of the National Parks. A first goal was identifying the current challenges at local and national levels. Some major issues involve the management of the increased number of tourists visiting the area, as well as strong pressure from (often non-local) companies to facilitate rapid communal development. Administrative changes in Slovakia are a sensitive subject, as the responsibility for the National Park recently switched from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to the Ministry of Environment, resulting in the Park itself experiencing an elevated turnover of the directorial staff during past years with concomitant changes in governance and management practices.
A further important discussion revolved around the involvement and direct participation of local people in managing the National Park. A representative of the Polish National Park was enthusiastic about giving more space to an exchange with local people and considering how national level policies can be addressed at a local scale. A particular and delicate aspect concerns the identification and delimitation of National Park zones where human access is strongly canalised and limited, a question that is managed differently on the Slovak and the Polish side. The Polish National Park charges entrance fees for important parts of its (relatively small) area, which helps channel tourist movements while generating an income to support the Park management and communication. This model seems to work well, raising the question how a similar system could be implemented on the Slovak side and how the resulting income could be properly distributed among the Park and local stakeholders. All discussions weighed up the needs of local people and of the National Parks’ flora and fauna, revealing interesting opportunities for further research and action.
The participants also had quite instructive conversations about the potential costs and benefits of rewilding on local livelihoods and tourism – a key research area in the wildE project (read our detailed article on this topic by Tim de Kruiff here). A particular focus was placed on opportunity costs (the loss of alternatives when a certain choice is made). While the cost of implementing rewilding is close to zero, opportunities from alternative forest management options could be lost by implementing rewilding. However, the workshop participants observed (with a slight surprise) that opportunity costs associated with rewilding generally seem to be low in the area. We will see if this first impression will be confirmed during a planned, more extensive survey.
The potential impacts of climate change also featured inevitably on the agenda. It cannot be assumed that forest tree species thriving well today will continue to thrive under future climatic conditions and associated disturbances. This has profound implications for forest management and policy. In the Tatra context, dealing with an environment that is still very wild is an advantage, because forests managed with limited intervention tend to be more resistant (they withstand better) and more resilient (they recover better) to stresses and disturbances arising in a warmer world.
The workshop was a brilliant opportunity to centre social and environmental scientists in Tatra Mountains rewilding discussions, and this fascinating area will doubtlessly concentrate numerous more specific research activities within wildE. As the project evolves, we look forward to sharing our research findings, insights and recommendations with anybody interested to learn more about the matter.
Here you can learn more about the workshop:
https://wilderness-society.org/wilde-project-is-about-climate-and-biodiversity/
https://wilderness-society.org/tatra-mountains-as-a-part-of-wilde-project/
https://enrsi.rtvs.sk/articles/science-and-nature/369901/green-slovakia-making-slovakia-wild-again