What is FORESTING?


"FORESTING" is a coined term by Shibata, referring to 'the way people coexist with forests and nature' and 'the overall activities where people engage with forests and nature to enjoy the various blessings and values they provide.' It encompasses all social and cultural actions related to nature, such as traditional forestry production activities and local residents' foraging activities. Moreover, it includes a wide range of activities like environmental markets that focus on payments for ecosystem services (PES*) for the blessings of forests and nature that have been receiving global attention in recent years, new businesses utilizing untapped resources, forest service industries, and the use of forests for health, recreation, environmental education, and outdoor education.
* PES refers to environmental policy measures for the conservation and enhancement of nature's blessings (ecosystem services), known as 'Payments for Ecosystem Services'. It can be defined as 'various innovative schemes where the beneficiaries or users of natural services pay or contribute funds to the managers or suppliers of those services', or 'business methods that create new income streams through investments in ecosystems'. Examples include public mechanisms like the forest environment tax, mandatory offset markets that are active in the United States, and voluntary payment systems (where urban residents who utilize downstream water pay for the management of upstream water sources).
As economic activities, it highlights the diverse blessings of the forest and the provision and sale of social and cultural services (ecosystem services), including traditional forestry production activities and forest service industries, representing a comprehensive business of "holistic forestry**."
**) “Holistic Forestry” is a term that Shibata first proposed 47 years ago, which refers not only to timber production but also to various businesses that utilize the blessings and products of forests, including the forest service industry (which involves recreational use of forest spaces) and environmental markets (such as carbon credits and biodiversity credits). Promoting a sustainable “Holistic Forestry” rooted in local communities will contribute to the realization of the SDGs and the creation of a nature-compatible society.
In addition to these economic activities, it encompasses all kinds of non-economic activities related to forests, such as traditional interactions with forests by local residents, recreational activities by urban dwellers, and interactions with forests and nature by children. It allows everyone to take the lead in various ways such as engaging with the forest (walking in the forest, enjoying the forest, creating the forest, observing the forest, researching the forest, consuming forest products, nurturing the forest...), learning from the forest, being healed by the forest, and various scenes where people directly or indirectly interact with forests and nature.
