Forests are currently in the spotlight, as they play a crucial role in addressing some of society’s most pressing challenges, including climate change and biodiversity loss. While forests are key to addressing these global issues, they, and the sector responsible for their management, are facing a complex set of intertwined threats and opportunities. Many of these challenges are well-documented, but solutions often remain elusive. Additionally, there are emerging trends that have yet to receive widespread attention.

Earlier this year I was involved in a horizon scan, aimed at identifying these upcoming issues that are likely to impact the field of forest management in the UK over the next half-century. These are challenges that, while currently under-recognized, have the potential to significantly influence the entire sector and extend their reach beyond it.

Considering that forest management operates on extended time scales, the importance of having a keen foresight is self-evident. So, the research, now available in the journal Forests, helps ensure the resilience and sustainability of our forests for the years to come.

The research employed a well-established horizon scanning methodology, engaging a diverse expert panel, to compile and prioritise a list of 180 proposed issues. After a rigorous process, we selected the top 15 most critical concerns for further examination.

The top-ranked issue, ‘Catastrophic forest ecosystem collapse,’ highlights the consensus on the potential for such a collapse and its far-reaching implications across the sector and society as a whole. The 15 issues encompass a wide range of themes, from environmental shocks to evolving political and socio-economic factors, underscoring the complexity of their interactions.

The 15 horizon scan issues identified were:

1. Catastrophic forest ecosystem collapse
2. Increased drought and flooding change the social costs and benefits of trees
3. Forest management becomes more challenging due to changing seasonal working windows
4. Protecting and enhancing soil microbial ecology becomes a higher priority
5. Viruses and viroids emerge as pathogens of increasing importance for trees
6. eDNA revolutionises our understanding of forest ecosystems
7. Trees are at the heart of future urban planning
8. The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) drives transparency and investment in nature-positive management
9. Natural capital funding streams are greatly upscaled
10. New technologies facilitate widespread adoption of smart silviculture
11. New technologies improve worker health and safety
12. New wood product markets stimulate more active forest management
13. UK commercial forest resources may not match future value chains
14. Unpredictable supply and demand dynamics in global wood product markets
15. International commitments will spotlight ecosystem integrity and drive monitoring efforts.

From my perspective, I was pleased that a human-nature relationship issue made it through from the 180 long list to the final 15 most critical issues – placing trees are at the heart of future urban planning. There weren’t many broadly social issues on the long list and a couple covered the potential for woodland management to foster human engagement with nature, for connection, wellbeing and one health. However, trees being at the centre of urban planning captures some of this thinking and was endorsed as a priority by the diverse expert panel.

It reflects the recent shift in environment science-policy thinking recognising that for a sustainable future there is a need for a fundamental change in the way that citizens, institutions and societies relate to and value nature (e.g. Stockholm+50: Unlocking a Better Future). Although accepted that woodland provides significant health benefits, UK urban centres tend to lack easy access to significant woodlands. There is a need for urban planning and planting principles to move beyond a focus on issues such as carbon storage and recreational access to the potential for wider benefits and societal impact. Given that the UK is one of the least nature-connected societies in Europe (White et al., 2021), integrating treescapes into and around urban areas will bring important opportunities to transform the ways society relates to and values nature and thereby protects biodiversity and responds to climate change (Richardson et al., 2020). These challenges and new objectives will have significant implications for both the forestry and arboricultural sectors, which will need to work closely together.