to supplement its other forest planning and analysis services. Tribes need better access to relevant science-based information about the impacts on local forests, management options, and the carbon sequestration value of their forests. Intertribal organizations have performed important services in helping some tribes acquire tools and understand and use key science findings, but the level of demand for services has outstripped program delivery capacity and most tribes’ human capacity to fully adopt these products and tools. 6. Incorporate adaptation planning into the IRMP and FMP planning processes of tribes using a template that integrates traditional and scientific knowledge. This was aligned with other IFMAT III recommendations such as shifting to a desired- future-conditions based approach, better inventory data, more technical support for forest planning, recognizing, and accounting for natural processes, more extensive use of the IRMPs, and integrating woodland management considerations into tribal FMPs. The links among the IFMAT III tasks and its climate questions showed that the improvements together could create a stronger platform for bringing planning and field implementation to better address the rapidly and constantly changing interactions of climate change. BIA has not issued policies or other forms of guidance on incorporation of climate into
the FMPs or IRMPs. IFMAT III made a case for using forest management plans to address climate change and integrating climate information and scenarios into plan components and strategies. However, few tribes have yet to incorporate climate change into their forest management plans, despite a growing network of available assistance, the growth of climate adaptation and restoration coalitions, and a growing body of practice and lessons being learned about developing adaptation strategies. The team found little progress in integration into formal plans, in part because few plans have been revised during the period. Some of this reluctance stems from the absence of guidance and technical service capacity for trust lands. The absence of planning was not because the forestry staff did not accept the scientific evidence of climate change or felt that it was not important. During IFMAT IV tribal visits, the team observed forestry managers and tribal leadership more readily accepting the inevitability and implications of a rapidly changing climate and including them in discussions about their forest management strategies. There has been exemplary work by some tribes and intertribal groups in tackling individual impacts through vulnerability assessments and the application of silvicultural strategies. Some tribes were attempting to build climate adaptation into their forestry programs and practices outside of any formal planning process (Tribal Adaptation Menu Team 2019).
The hope of IFMAT III was that tribes could become key players in landscape scale partnerships and in implementing practices to manage climate vulnerabilities. Although institutional arrangements and tools such as the Tribal Forest Protection Act, the Good Neighbor Authority, Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Act, and other programs were relatively new at the time and associated more with forest health improvements than longer-term climate change adaptation. Little of the financial assistance available can be used for implementation of plans or for pioneering climate-informed management actions. Most was aimed at planning and assessment and to non-forestry resource concerns such as wildlife, biodiversity, water, human health, and other concerns. Perhaps the funds being allocated at this writing will stimulate more systematic planning and adaptive implementation to bring tribal forestry operations into the mainstream of climate-informed management. Observations during the IFMAT IV process confirmed that many of the issues described by the IFMAT III team were still present during the 2009-2019 period. Some progress has been made, but all of the recommendations deserve a second reading and incorporation into a new plan of implementation given the rate of change in climate factors and a current funding environment more favorable to both climate response and active forest management. Lingering structural and policy issues will have to be addressed before climate-informed forest planning and practice can be fully implemented and integrated into
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