Toward a Scientific and Social Framework for Ecologically Based Stewardship of Federal Lands and Waters

December 4-15, 1995
Sheraton El Conquistador Hotel, Tucson, Arizona

GOAL

Engage the scientific and management communities in the development of a detailed framework that addresses options for implementing an ecologically based approach to stewardship of Federal lands and waters and documents the scientific foundation for those options.
The framework will integrate technical, social, and economic considerations to form the basis for how we will use and sustain natural resources both nationally and globally. It will require:

(1) a clear description of an ecological approach for management;
(2) an understanding of the relationship between an ecologically based approach to stewardship and how sustainability can be understood and addressed;
(3) a scientific consensus regarding the components of an ecological approach to management; and
(4) accommodating people and their needs within ecosystems.

CONTEXT

The workshop is designed to take the current state of our scientific knowledge and eliminate the usual development lag of 10 to 15 years it has historically taken to bring new knowledge from the scientific community to routine use in the land management community.
As such it is one piece of the larger strategy to develop a comprehensive framework and use this as the base to address implementation issues and strategies between and within agencies. The framework provides a picture of key elements, activities and barriers that can be used to focus agency actions in the coming years. It can also be used by a broad range of other land managers and owners as they see fit in their operations.
This workshop is a logical step to follow previous efforts in the development of ecological approaches to land and resource management undertaken by federal agencies. These include the

"1994 Congressional Research Service Report to Congress ";Ecosystem Management: Federal Agency Activities,
the President's Commission for Sustainable Development,
and the effort undertaken by the Interagency Ecosystem Management Task Force, "The Ecosystem Approach: Healthy Ecosystems and Sustainable Economies".

The workshop will also provide critical input to the upcoming 7th American Forestry Congress in February 1996 and for the Forest Service is a workshop in March of 1996 to develop actions and guidelines for implementing an ecological approach to management through existing decision making processes.

OUTPUT

The vision of the final product for the workshop is a clear scientific framework for ecologically based stewardship approaches in general. The framework will outline guidelines and options for applications in common situations and lay out key questions or information that managers and agencies ought to consider or assess in relation to resources at certain scales. It will be published in book form and will be a compendium of the papers that synthesize the available scientific basis and that develop the management options and alternatives for implementing an ecologically based approach to stewardship in the field. The framework and related information are NOT intended to provide prescriptive solutions for individual sites or places but will provide the foundation for the development of agency implementation plans and strategies.

FOCUS

The workshop is NOT intended to provide general information or to be an education event. The workshop is designed to develop a specific product -- a technical reference for an ecological approach to stewardship of Federal lands and waters. It is intended to be primarily a working meeting of scientists and land managers to discuss the scientific basis and implementation options for an ecologically based approach to stewardship and to provide professional documentation of the current state-of-the-art thinking regarding such an approach.

MECHANISM

The workshop will be organized around the synthesis of existing scientific knowledge on 30 key topic areas (3-6 scientists and managers per topic), and on a parallel treatment of the experience and options for implementing those components on the ground by managers (6-12 managers and scientists per topic). The related management option topics will have papers prepared by field personnel from a number of agencies and groups. These management option papers will bring forward the best experience available in how to successfully implement the key components of an ecological approach to management.

The workshop will be used to provide comment on the draft papers and to develop dialogue on various options and management questions to implement key concepts on the ground. The workshop phase will rely heavily on specific case examples that document their success/failure to deal with specific practical steps/actions for implementation. The workshop breakouts will develop a list of options, and applicability to certain situations and circumstances. These will then be developed into summary papers that synthesize the products of the multiple breakouts that are linked in the final publication to the scientific foundation papers. A comprehensive framework document will be published by a major University Press in the Fall of 1996.

INVOLVED NGO's

American Fisheries Society
American Forest and Paper Association
American
Forests
American Motorcyclist Association
Association of Consulting Foresters
Champion International
Defenders of Wildlife
Meridian Oil
Motorcycle Industry Council
National Association of State Foresters
National Research Council
Natural Resources Defense Council
Pacific Rivers Council
Resources for the Future
The Nature Conservancy.

CONTACT

Dr. Robert Szaro, Co-Executive Secretary - Workshop Planning Group

Telephone: 202-205-1316
Fax: 202-205-1530