Throughout 2025, the SocialForest Interreg Sudoe project has reached an important milestone in its efforts to make forests in southwest Europe more resilient to the effects of climate change. This milestone is the completion of the selection of measures that will form part of the Transnational Forest Strategy designed within the framework of SocialForest. The document will serve as a guide for the replicability of actions in other regions of the Sudoe area, as its objective is to be shared and adapted to different territories. In this way, a joint and effective approach to sustainable forest management would be encouraged.
Specifically, the measures included in the Transnational Forest Strategy set out practical actions to help forests in southwest Europe be better prepared for climate impacts. The development of this document has required extensive collaborative work among all consortium partners and has been led and coordinated by the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV).
Among the most significant advances is the implementation of a monitoring system that compares the effects of improvement treatments in one plot with those in a similar untreated plot within the pilot action in CehegÃn (Murcia). This initiative aims to generate data that allow for an accurate assessment of which practices are most effective and under what conditions, thereby strengthening the scientific basis for future actions in forests across the Sudoe area. This specific action is being carried out by the Directorate General for Natural Heritage and Climate Action, under the Regional Ministry of Environment, Universities, Research and the Mar Menor of the Region of Murcia, in close collaboration with the Department of Hydraulic Engineering and Environment of the UPV.
Thanks to these advances, the SocialForest project is consolidating its practical and collaborative approach to addressing the challenges that climate change poses to forest ecosystems in southwest Europe.
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