| The Effects of Climate Change on Forest Insect Disturbance in South Korea: Challenges and Prospects | |||
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| Author | An, Hyunjin | ||
| Views | 73453 | Publication Date | 2019.02.26 |
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Research Background The effects of climate change, such as drought and abnormal temperatures, are progressively becoming more of a reality. The change that climate change brought on the forest environments and emersion of pests call for a more delicate management measure. Therefore, it is necessary to reevaluate the current control method and establish a direction of a new preventive strategy considering the trend of climate change. For this effort, basic research should be conducted to objectively assess the damage and the potential economic threat of forest pests. In particular, it is very important to establish the damage rate (damage function) that reflects direct and indirect factors of forest pests. The damage rate must be determined in order to measure the actual loss caused by the damage such as its effect on economics. The pest prediction model currently in use in Korea predicts the occurrence risk; however, it is limited as to measuring a definite damage rate and the economic ripple effect that it causes. Analyzing the damage and the economic impact of forest pests is crucial as it provides the basic information necessary to solve upcoming ecosystem disturbances and maintain healthy and productive forests. It can also serve as an objective foundation for policy-making to prevent other pest disasters caused by climate change and to help adapt to future climates. Research Method The target subjects of this study are the most common forest pests and the main damaged tree species in Korea. With the advice of experts in the field, the pine wilt disease and the oak wilt disease have been selected as the target pests - reflecting the increasing trend of deciduous forests. To measure the damages inflicted by pests, the structural damage function used in studies such as Cobourn et al. (2011) and Kim Yongjun et al. (2015) was implemented, and also the nonlinear panel probit model and the GEE estimation method were introduced. In addition, the mean per panel value was added to the model according to the method proposed by Mundlak (1978) and Chamberlain (1980) to reflect the fixed effect that has not been observed. The estimated damage function and RCP8.5 data were used to predict the future damage rate of pests caused by climate change. The damage rate of future pine tree wilt and oak wilt was predicted for the next 80 years from 2018 to 2100, and GIS was used to show the future damage rate by city/county areas. In the assessment of the economic impact by the forests, the concept of environmental payout was introduced to take into account the economics of wood and non-wood materials. For the economic analysis, three scenarios were set up: no pest outbreak (baseline), pest infestation (no pest control), and pest infestation (prevention and control). And the earnings and the forest management revenues that included the wood and non-wood materials for each scenario were compared. Based on the results of the analysis, simulation was conducted to investigate the changes in forest management revenues such as changes in wood market prices, environmental payouts, climate change, and usage of infected trees. Research Results and Implications After the estimation of the damage function and prediction of the future damage rate, it was confirmed that the future damage owing to forest pests and the extent of the damage areas would increase due to climate change. In addition, the analysis of economic impacts showed that the increase of pest damage caused by climate change would worsen forest management revenues and increase uncertainty. As pest damage brought on by climate change is expected to increase uncertainties and economic losses, there is a marked need to review the policies that have been focusing only on post-response tasks. In addition to proper post-incident management, it is necessary to stably control pests through the reinforcement of pre-incident management. As a precautionary strengthening measure, identification of key management subjects, improvement of tree health, improvement of pest resistance through the development and replacement of species, and elimination of externalities through environmental payment were suggested. Until now, low forest management revenues have led to a lack of incentives for forest owners to focus on pest control, thus depending on the country to carry out pest control. However, if the pest increases due to climate change in the future, the current government-based management system may face a shortage of budget and workforce. Therefore, there is a need to encourage individual forest owners to actively manage pests through better profit caused by healthy forests. In order to supplement the post-treatment measures, it is possible to immediately treat dead trees due to oak wilt disease; strengthen the prevention of artificial spreading of pine wilt disease; and expand the use of infected trees to enhance forest management profits. The contributions of this study are that it establishes pest damage functions that consider various factors and evaluates the economic impact of pest insect considering management factors using dynamic analysis. Previous studies mostly used the static method such as partial equilibrium when they evaluate economic effects of the forest pests, and did not consider various management factors such as pest control which can possibly affect the real damage. However, in this study, the demographic variables used to assess anthropogenic activities have limitations in that they do not reveal a specific correlation between detailed history of activities and the damage rates. It is necessary to identify substitutional variables that can represent the details of future artificial activities and reflect them in the model. The relationship between the details for pest control, the efficiency of the pest control and the profitability of the forest management can be suggested as a future research topic. Researchers: An Hyunjin, Lee Sangmin, Choi Junyeong Research period: 2018. 1 . ~ 2018. 10. E-mail address: hjan713@krei.re.kr |
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